Duality
by IchaIchasennin
Summary: Growing as an outcast, Naruto never got to learn how people really worked. Then he learns the transformation jutsu and life is forever changed. A serious story with serious smut. Detailed disclaimer inside
1. The simplest things (I)

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the related characters.**

**WARNING! THIS STORY WILL CONTAIN GRAPHIC DEPICTIONS OF VIOLENT AND/OR SEXUAL THEMES (but not in this chapter). See footnotes before wasting time on a story you wouldn't want to read.**

**This is a tale intended for an adult audience who can enjoy in written words what can't and SHOULD NOT be enjoyed in real life.**

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**Chapter 1  
The simplest things are the most beautiful (I)  
****or: How I learned to love the Henge-no-Jutsu (I)**

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_Konohagakure-no-Sato, the Village hidden in the Leaves, was one the strongest of the five ninja villages if not the strongest at the time of this tale._

_Like any of the of Elemental Nations, and more importantly like any other ninja village, it had its number of peculiar individuals among its ranks. No one, however, was peculiar as Uzumaki Naruto._

_Thirteen years old, blond, brash, far too loud for anyone's good and with a penchant for bright orange clothes; Naruto had a very interesting secret._

_Truthfully, the secrets were two. One was known to a large number of Konoha's citizens, but was strangely unknown to its recipient. The other one, well... the other one was known only to Naruto and no one else._

-xXx-

How do children learn? By looking at the people the people around them, of course; picking up nuances of behavior from the people closest to them, starting with their own parents and then from close interactions with other people.

So, what would happen if a single child was let bereft of parents from a young age? What if, in addition to that, the child was shunned from adults and children alike for reasons unspoken?

The child would grow, obviously, with a very askew sense of things. They would learn and understand the most superficial layers of socially accepted behaviors, but they would fail to grasp their underlying meanings and all those things that weren't spoken of in presence of children but picked up all the same.

Without proper guidance they would grow on an unpredictable path, developing thought processes of their own, simultaneously striving for an acceptance that would get progressively farther from them as their growth differed from the norm.

For years Naruto tried to be acknowledged, failing without knowing why, hated for something few knew about and fewer still could even speak of . Nonetheless, their hatred was carefully passed to the next generation despite the best attempts of Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Third Hokage, to dissuade it.

Thus Naruto grew alone among a multitude of people for as long as eleven years. When it came time to be enrolled in the Ninja Academy, like every other wards of the state, the orphan had reached the inevitable conclusion that being Uzumaki Naruto, quite simply, _sucked royally_.

Then the scroll with the instructions for the Henge, one of the simplest jutsu of all, was dropped in his lap. And just like that Uzumaki Naruto had suddenly no obligations to be Uzumaki Naruto all the time anymore.

Sometimes the simplest things are the most beautiful.

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**This story will contain depictions of:**

**HETEROSEXUALITY (M/F), HOMOSEXUALITY (M/M and F/F), SEXUAL PROMISCUITY, RAPE, MIND CONTROL, BODY SHAPING (willing and unwilling), GENDER BEDING (Male to Female and Female to Male), TRANSEXUALITY, WILLING and JOYFUL PROSTITUTION, SADISM, MASOCHISM and UNDERAGE SEX.**

**If you are not fine with all of the above and others that are not yet mentioned please read no further.**

**The author doesn't condone acts of actual rape UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE (unless it's willing roleplay, but then it's not actually rape).**

**UNDERAGE SEX, unlike what most people think, is not prohibited in every first world country if consensual and within certain parameters. As such, taking it as an offense is entirely a subjective experience.**

**More info at: wiki/Age_of_consent#By_country_or_region**


	2. The simplest things (II)

**Chapter 2  
The simplest things are the most beautiful (II)  
****or: How I learned to love the Henge-no-Jutsu (II)**

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Late into the evening of Konohagakure-no-Sato, a blonde teenage girl not older than sixteen sashayed out of a wealthy merchant's mansion. Her kimono, loose upon her shoulders did very little to conceal her generous cleavage from the scrutiny of the passersby. The sway of her hips was slow and seductive without being pretentious. Her legs, long and lissom, poked out of her kimono with each single step.

Girls like her weren't a rare sight in that part of town. Wealth was expressed in many ways and only sometimes that form plain gold. Other times it came forth in the shape of luxurious mansions, some other times it was high quality food and some other yet it was a young attractive woman for hire.

Still, although not rare a sight, she couldn't be called common either. Plenty of women went into that line of business, most driven by need and few out of pleasure, but fewer still were so stunningly beautiful. A woman of that caliber, as young and inexperienced as she might have been, would have fetched a very high price.

Yet, there was none of the high strung attitude of a call girl who attended to the nobles and the extremely wealthy. She smiled politely to everyone she came by, even the jealous wives who clutched firmly their wide-eyed husbands. She even acknowledged the cat-calls and the less-than-polite compliments she received passing through the common area of the village. She could have been the average next door girl, in behavior if not in looks.

She waved and smiled to everyone without exception, although she didn't speak a word to anyone not even for a greeting.

She made her way silently across the village, drawing the gaze of most men and a few women as well, until she reached the red-light district, slipping into the house of pleasure with a nod from the guards at the gate.

The Velvet Room was Konoha's most renown brothel. There was a month-long wait to book an appointment with any of the women working there and your average merchant could not easily afford their company even for just a single night.

The blond girl waved through customers and working girls alike, acknowledging and being acknowledged by some of the most powerful men of the country, until she reached the Mistress' private quarters.

Making her presence known with a knock on the wooden frame, she let herself slip inside, sliding the door close behind her. The seals on the walls glowed, shutting the room from all possible eavesdroppers as soon as she did so.

"Welcome back," the sultry voice of a woman in her thirties greeted the much younger girl.

Miwako-san, the Mistress, was a stunningly beautiful woman with a refined looking visage, long raven hair that reached all the way to her feet and a cleavage worthy of the fabled Tsunade of the Sannin.

She was seated at her desk, leaning in her chair in a position of watchful ease, toying with the cup of sake in her hand.

She was a woman who knew how to deal and take pleasure in equal measure, from men and women alike. She had controlled the establishment for well over ten years now, laying with influential people who kept the world at their fingertips, treasuring their whisper of pleasure as well as the secret shared in confidence.

Perhaps the latter not so much, considering that she was a kunoichi tasked with prying as many secrets as she possibly could from her clients and reporting them directly to the Hokage.

There was a grand total of six people who knew of her actual job. One was of course the Hokage, the other was the previous Mistress who used to serve the very same role and the Hokage's two closest confidants. Finally Miwako herself and the blonde girl who just returned from her assignment.

"I assume everything went smoothly," she said to her tight-lipped subordinate. "Did you get what we needed?"

The blond girl frowned, putting both hands to her hips and cocking them to the side in a defiant manner. Although silent, she made her point across perfectly.

_'Who do you take me for?'_ her stance seemed to ask.

Miwako laughed softly and handed her a glass vial with a cork. The girl uncorked it, then she opened her mouth and let white, thick semen flow from her lips to her outstretched tongue and into the container, closing it with its cork and handing it back.

There was, it seemed, a bit too much of it as she aptly swallowed what was left in her mouth.

"You know," Miwako said amusedly, "some blood of a few strands of hair would have sufficed."

"And how did you expect me to get those without him noticing?" the blonde asked. "Besides it was him who asked me to hold it in my mouth until I got back."

"And of course it was far from you to _displease_ a customer," Miwako chuckled. "Truly, some people don't know the first thing about basic security."

"So, I take that you have enough _'genetic material'_ to get through the seals?"

"Yes, this much will do. We'll be in and out of his warehouse without anyone being the wiser. You did a good job tonight, dear. Here's your payment." Miwako tossed a small bag filled with coins and the blonde snatched it in midair. "You've earned your rest now. If I recall correctly, tomorrows is your graduation day. You can take a bath upstairs and sleep in my bed, if you don't mind me joining you later."

"Whatever," the blond shrugged, heading for the stairs to the side of the room.

"Sweet dreams, " she said at her retreating back, "Naruto-kun."

Naruto stepped in Miwako's luxurious bathroom, dropping her kimono on the floor unceremoniously and exposing her body, naked if not for her minuscule triangle of clothing that covered her lower regions. Discarding that as well, she washed her supple body with cold water before sliding inside the bath, where she soaked in blissful warmth.

A sigh of pleasure escaped her lips. Few things could beat a bath in a hot spring after a long exertion. The only way the evening could get any better was with a steaming hot bowl of ramen but Miwako, that heathen, didn't like it so she didn't keep any at her place.

But it had been a good day all the same. She got her mission done, she had gotten laid and she got paid a hefty sum for it. She really didn't know why everyone didn't do this as a job, but she figured that if everyone were to, there would be no one left to pay for it.

Even though they had explained it to her and even though she rationally knew why, Naruto couldn't understand what problem people had with sex. Yes, she knew and she understood the issue with unwanted pregnancies and STDs, but there were ways around those. Yet, although everyone with few exception liked doing it, everyone but a scant few who were labeled as perverts stuck up their noses just at the mention of it. Go figure.

Well, it was all the better for Naruto in her book. She liked doing it a lot and she was paid to do it. To think that if not for the Henge-no-jutsu she would have been still alone and isolated, and that without _his_ guidance she could have grown up like some of stuck-ups it gave her the shivers.

Now she enjoyed life at its fullest and she knew how it felt to be acknowledged if not even loved and the following day she would get her Hitai-ate, finally becoming a full-fledged ninja. Then she would really make the world acknowledge the real Uzumaki Naruto without lies and deceptions.

She stepped out of the bathroom and dried her body. Yawning she went for Miwako's bedroom where she curled naked into her futon to get her well deserved rest.

"Oh, I forgot," she said, opening her eyes again. "**Kage Henge!"**

A cloud of smoke burst and by the time it dissipated Naruto, a sixteen years old _boy_, was already laying back down and on his way to a deep slumber.

-xXx-

"Uzumaki Naruto!" the scarred Iruka-sensei called. "Perform the Bushin-no-justu."

_'Ah! '_ Naruto laughed inwardly. _'Piece of cake.'_

Sticking out his index and middle fingers from both hands, Naruto formed a peculiar cross-shaped sign and molded his chakra. With a loud popping noise and several burst of smoke, five clones appeared around him.

"YO!" they said in unison, pumping their fists into the air.

"One clone would have been enough, Naruto," Iruka said, managing somehow to sound something between amused and resigned at his student's antics. "Well, that's good enough for me. Mizuki-san?"

"Congratulation, Uzumaki-san," the other shinobi said, handing over the Hitai-ate with the emblazoned leaf symbol. "You're officially a shinobi of the Leaf."

"YAH-OH!" he exclaimed snatching away the metal band and putting it around his neck. "Thank you, Iruka-sensei, Mizuki-sensei."

"Yeah, yeah," the scarred Chūnin said, waving his hand dismissively but smiling all the same. "Move along now, we've got more students to test. Be back tomorrow for your team placement."

"Got it, sensei," the teenager screamed, already halfway to the door.

"I can't believed the dobe actually passed," a student said laughing at Naruto's antics.

"Yeah. I don't think I would have kept trying if I got held back twice."

"You haven't passed yet, Inuzuka-san," Iruka shouted at him. "I don't recall your grades being much better than Uzumaki's on his first try. In fact, I recall you having barely enough credits to qualify for the exam in the first place." Akamaru, Kiba's faithful dog companion, barked in agreement with the teacher.

"Gh!" Inuzuka Kiba gulped shutting his mouth. "Whose side are you on?" he hissed at his dog, which complained with a whine.

Naruto heard nothing of this. He had already bolted out of the academy and was running through the streets of Konoha shouting at the top of his lungs. He didn't pay any attention to the glares of the people who muttered curses under their breath about the demon brat that had become a shinobi. They didn't matter, many of them were among those who lusted more or less openly after Naruto's female body.

They didn't know him for real, but he would show them in the years to come. He would become Hokage one day, dattebayo!

Now, however, was a time for celebration.

"So, Naruto-kun finally passed," Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage said taking a breath from his pipe. He didn't need anyone reporting that piece of news. The shouts coming from Kohona's loudest and most unpredictable shinobi of Konoha could be heard anywhere within the walls of the Village.

_'Most unpredictable shinobi,'_ Sarutobi scoffed inwardly. _'Never such title has been so fitting yet so incredibly shortcoming.'_

The Third Hokage had mixed feeling about Naruto. The Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi, the nine-tailed demon fox that had wrecked the village sixteen years prior, had not turned out how anyone expected him to be. Certainly not like how most villagers thought of him: like nothing more than the beast he jailed, bidding its time until it gained back its foul power and exacted its revenge upon the Leaf; but neither he had become what the people who actually knew him expected.

Hiruzen always knew Naruto would have joined the ranks of Konoha's protectors, a Jinchuuriki didn't really have any other option, but he couldn't imagine how he would have grown up to be.

In a sense, the Third Hokage believed he had failed both Naruto and his parents. He had been so blind and so willing to trust the people he was sworn to protect that he had been caught completely unprepared by Naruto's sudden... _development_. By the time he found out what kind of habits his pseudo grandson had grown into there was little to do but to run damage control.

Perhaps it was a miracle that they still managed to make him into a somewhat balanced person, although perhaps they had to reconsider the meaning of that word.

How could he have allowed such a thing to come to pass? The thought of it would haunt him to his dying breath.

-xXx-

**_Eight years earlier _**

Naruto was a very unhappy young boy. For two years he had been living on his own in a dirty rundown apartment in the poorest section of Konoha. To his memory, he had always been alone. His parents left him or they died, which was the same in his mind, and people hated his guts for no apparent reason.

The old lady at the orphanage detested him, that much was clear. She never stopped the older kids from harassing him but she was always there to scold him when he fought back. She always gave him as little to eat as she could get away with and while she had never been outright violent she was never once compassioned with him either.

He thought that if he lived on his own it would have been better and that he could make friends. At age six, when the Hokage came to visit him, he insisted that he could handle himself and the old man allowed him to move out, going as far as to give him a small stipend to get by.

He had been mistaken though. People hated him everywhere he went; adults and children alike. People he never even met before shouted at him to get away from them and to stay away from their children. Shopkeepers threw him out of their shops or overpriced him so much for old stuff and expired food that even a kid like him noticed it right away.

He was alone and hated by almost everyone.

_'Might as well give them a reason to hate me,'_ he thought the day he begun with the pranks all over Konoha. It didn't win him any affection, of course, but at least he had some fun at his haters' expenses.

He kept going at it even after he joined the academy, which earned him quite a few punishments from the teachers.

The only people who didn't hate him were the old man Hokage and people from Ichiraku, the ramen stand. Those were the only people who spoke to him kindly but they didn't have all day for him.

So Naruto grew alone. His efforts to integrate himself with his peers were shot down time after time and he never knew _why_. The other orphans didn't receive the same treatment, so why? Why him?

That question went unanswered for many years.

One day at the academy, one of the few days he bothered to attend, Naruto listened to the history of the Hokage, people like the old man, the strongest Shinobi of the Leaf like the Fourth Hokage that fought and defeated the Kyuubi.

Naruto thought that if he could become Hokage too, people would finally acknowledge and respect him for something he actually did. That became his dream and the dream became a oath.

But dreams and oaths don't make loneliness go away.

Then, after many tedious lessons about chakra coils, chakra control and whatnot, the teachers gave him and every other student a jutsu. The scroll for the Henge-no-jutsu, a technique to change their appearance into whomever they wanted to if they put in enough effort to make it look decent.

It was like Christmas had come early for Naruto. A boy that hated being himself nearly all year long had been given the opportunity to become anyone else.

Needless to say, Naruto poured heart and mind over the technique. It didn't come easy, far from it in fact. His chakra control was shoddy, at best, and his transformations could be seen through by civilians, much less a shinobi.

However, Naruto had nothing better to beside the occasional prank. With no family and no friends, Naruto divided his spare time between eating ramen and studying the Henge. At one time he didn't go to the academy for two months straight, which caused him to be held back for the first time due to the low attendance rate. When he showed up with a perfectly done Henge no one thought much of it. It was expected from a boy of his age.

In virtual isolation, Naruto kept training, improving his chakra control little by little and pulling off better and better transformations each time

Still, they couldn't fool a half-decent shinobi. The Henge was the most basics of all jutsu, taught not so much for his usefulness against other ninja but more as a way to teach children a harmless technique that would keep them interested and entertained at least for the first few months at the academy.

Later came Kawarimi, the substitution jutsu and Bushin, the clone jutsu. They were both useful in their own right but neither held even remotely the same interest as the Henge for a boy like Naruto. Kawarimi didn't help him much except to lose the ninja that chased after him following a successful prank. Also the level of chakra control required for the Bushin still escaped him.

Thus Henge it was, day and night, night and day. Finally he could fool civilians and shop for stuff at reasonable prices, but he had to be weary not to run in any ninja or the ruse would be up.

If he wanted to really become someone else he needed to be better at it. So good that even a ninja like the Hokage couldn't see through his transformations. A daunting task, but let it be known that Naruto was anything but a quitter.

When asked later, he couldn't tell how he did it. Perhaps it was due to the unique circumstances of his body, perhaps due to the inhuman chakra coursing though his coils in small quantities or perhaps it was just the true potential of the Henge that no one bothered to uncover in favor of inherently superior techniques.

But Naruto did it and one day, instead of weaving the particles of air around him to generate an illusion he weaved his own body.

It hurt a bit at first. Scratch that, it hurt a lot but the pain subsided shortly after and the transformation stayed. It wasn't an illusion anymore and the face staring back at him from the mirror wasn't that associated with Uzumaki Naruto anymore.

With that, Naruto begun truly exploring. For the first time to memory he played with other kids and they didn't hurt him or even taunt him. He was so overwhelmed that he cried himself to sleep that night, both from happiness and bitterness.

Why couldn't he have that as himself? What had he done wrong? Try as he might, no answer came from the empty walls of his apartment.

So Naruto kept changing. Becoming someone else meant more than just looking different, especially in a ninja village, where walls not only had ears, but also eyes and noses.

He went into short, daring forays among the other children, changing faces and companies often because he wasn't confident he would pass a more through identity check.

It was a slight improvement compared to his real self, but in the end he was still mostly alone.

However, he kept practicing. For the first time he sought books on his own. Human anatomy was something he needed to know like his own pockets. Trail, error and pain were his masters and under their harsh guidance his technique grew.

At age ten he experimented with different faces, types of voice, height, eye and hair color. After a while he notice that looking feminine, or being mistaken for a girl earned him a more positive responses all around. Things took a sharper turn out of chance, when strolling through town he overheard a mother scolding a group of kids a few years older than him.

At the time he wasn't really sure what the argument was about, except that it involved a magazine that Naruto had seen being passed around by the older kids before.

Said magazine was thrown unceremoniously into a nearby trash bin and the irate mother ushered away the flustered kids. Naruto nicked the thing away as soon as no one was looking and retreated into his rundown apartment to figure out what the fuss was all about.

Being an isolated eleven years old at the time, Naruto didn't understand what was the big deal about all the naked women portrayed in there, but even if he was too young to have a reaction himself he understood one thing quite clearly: men liked women, even better if they were well endowed in the chest and wore very little clothing.

So, the female body was obviously the next logical step.

Now, if Naruto had grown halfway normally he would have had second thoughts about passing for a girl. Society's imposition of masculinity for a male was taught through osmosis from a young age, but Naruto received very little of that and certainly not enough to form precognitions himself about genders. At an age where sexuality still had to manifest himself, Naruto had no problems with being a girl.

A year later, at age twelve , Naruto could seamlessly turn into a girl, with the proper functioning organs and everything. He checked to make sure: it been an awkward experience, but not an unpleasant one. In fact he took time to investigate the details of the new female body quite thoroughly.

That was also when he realized what the limit of his transformation was: no matter how he changed there was always the same volume of space. Mass could vary, making bones denser and muscle thicker at will, but he always ended occupying the amount of space somehow. Hence, it was impossible to become someone much bigger or much smaller. If he got taller he had to get thinner and vice-versa. In order to develop noticeable breasts he had to cut a bit on his height. Not too much, of course, but being still young he had little muscular mass to distribute elsewhere and with a bit of tweaking he managed several different impersonations.

So he went out into the world as a woman. A young woman, naive in the ways of humans and starving for any and every inkling of affection. A young, unassuming girl on the verge of becoming a full-fledged woman under Konoha's laws.

Needless to say, fresh meat free for the taking wouldn't be unnoticed for long in a cage of hungry wolves.

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**Last edit: 01/27/15**


	3. The simplest things (III)

**Chapter 3  
The simplest things are the most beautiful (III)  
****or: How I learned to love the Henge-no-Jutsu (III)**

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**Konoha's Academy - Day after graduation.**

Naruto waited impatiently to get assigned to a team. He was finally an active ninja. He only hoped he would get teamed up with someone he got along with.

Although he was still the village pariah, Naruto ever cheerful attitude inevitably rubbed off on others and while he was still being consider the idiot of the class, despite his improving grades, his peers no longer shunned him as they used to.

One after another his classmates were sorted into groups. Yamanaka Ino groaned quite loudly about not being placed with Uchiha Sasuke, the Rookie of the Year and Ino's long time crush. Make that nearly every girl's long time crush.

Naruto didn't quite understand what the big deal about Sasuke was. Sure, he was cute but all that brooding was a major turn off. He was silent and on his own all the time, despite being doted on by the teachers and fawned over by nearly every girl in the class. Naruto was curious about him, not because he found him cute, but because he found it odd that he looked nearly as alone as Naruto himself, despite their circumstances being the polar opposites.

Of course, everyone knew about the Uchiha massacre at the hands of Sasuke's older brother Itachi, just like it was common knowledge that Sasuke had missed one and a half year at the Academy because of the trauma of being the only survivor of his clan. Perhaps, he thought, Sasuke did have a pretty good reason to be sour and unsocial all the time and Naruto gave him the space and calm he seemed to crave.

When Sasuke was around, Naruto was quieter than usual, almost completely silent. They ended up sitting close to one another most days, with Sasuke sitting by the wall and Naruto occupying the only available spot on the other side.

That didn't win him any sympathy with the female half of the class. Especially not with Ino and her friend-slash-rival Haruno Sakura.

Speaking of which, Naruto liked Sakura a little bit as well. She was stubborn and headstrong but concealed it behind a quiet and shy demeanor around the teachers and around Sasuke. Naruto understood that feeling. After all, while he didn't conceal his true character, he turned into Nako every day for the sake of being loved and accepted. They didn't get along, but he would have minded being teamed up with her.

On cue with that thought, Iruka called out, "Team Seven: Uchiha Sasuke, Uzumaki Naruto and Haruno Sakura. Your Jonin-sensei will be Hatake Kakashi."

Sasuke acknowledged the team composition with the faintest nod in Naruto's direction and with a barely audible sigh when Sakura was called. The pink haired girl on the other hand whooped at being teamed with Sasuke, forgetting her lady-like persona in face of her unexpected luck. It seemed that having Naruto in the same team was just a minor inconvenience when the other third was the object of her affection. Or was it obsession.

Nevertheless, Naruto was ecstatic. Not only he had been place with the two people he preferred out of the whole class, but they also had _the_ Hatake Kakashi as their sensei. It made sense considering Sasuke's bloodline but it was still a great piece of news for Naruto.

His first day as a ninja was already one of the best of this life. At this rate he'd make Hokage in a month!

The various teams flooded out one by one when they sensei showed up, leaving only the newly appointed Team Seven to wait for their teacher.

A hour went by and there had been no trace of Kakashi whatsoever.

"... you think he forgot about the team placement?" Sakura asked after a while.

"Maybe he got caught up with an important mission and hasn't come back yet," Naruto offered helpfully, but his enthusiasm was deflating.

"He's here," Sasuke said confidently, "he has been watching us for a while now."

"WHAT!?" the two other teammates shouted, frantically looking around the empty classroom.

"Impressive," a disembodied voice said. "I didn't think a mere Genin fresh out of the Academy could spot me."

Hatake Kakashi was sitting in the spot behind Sasuke, leaning back on the chair with both feet on the desk, idly flipping through a book like he had always been there.

"What gave me away?" he asked.

"Nothing," Sasuke replied flatly, not turning to look at the experienced shinobi sitting behind him, but smirking behind the hands folded in front of his mouth. "It was just a wild guess."

Okay, Naruto admitted privately, that was a bit cool.

Kakashi's only visible eye widened momentarily before curving in a obvious smile.

"Well, aren't you the amusing one," he told to the raven haired young man. "Well, what did we learn today?"

"The value of patience?" Sakura offered still a bit surprised.

"Be paranoid all the time?" Naruto said instead.

"Yes on both account," the teacher replied approvingly, then turned serious. "Now, why don't you introduce yourselves? Names, likes, dislikes, dreams. You know, the usual stuff. You first pinkie."

"Ano... my name is Haruno Sakura. The thing I like is...," she glanced at Sasuke and blushed. "Kyaa!" Sasuke sighed again, this time loudly. "The thing I dislike is Naruto," the blonde dropped his head, "and my dream is...," again she glanced at Sasuke and blushed, "kyaa!"

"Riight," Kakashi said with the same enthusiasm visible on Sasuke's face. "What about you, with the blinding bright orange jumpsuit?"

Wait, was he insulting or complimenting Naruto's favorite color and male outfit?

"I'm Uzumaki Naruto," he proclaimed boldly, "the thing I like the most are ramen, the color orange and... something else. The things I hate the most are the three minutes it takes to prepare ramen and people who judge others by their appearance and by rumors. My ambition is to become Hokage and make everyone acknowledge and respect me for who I am."

"Well, that's an impressive goal but will you be able to live up to it? Next, what about the brooder?"

Sasuke ignored the barb with the practiced ease of someone who heard it far too often.

"Uchiha Sasuke. I don't have any likes or dislike but my dreams is to kill a certain person and restore my clan." With that declaration his eyes turned red and two tomoe started rotating around his left iris menacingly.

Yes, Naruto thought, that was pretty much what everyone imagined. Sakura seemed to swoon at Sasuke's badass declaration, but Naruto was mostly concerned. Sasuke would make for a formidable teammate, but he was afraid of his murderous desires.

"And you, Sensei? What about you?"

"Hmm?" the Jonin asked lazily. "My name is Hatake Kakashi. I have no intention of telling you my likes and dislikes... as for my dreams, let just say I have a lot of hobbies."

"That's a bit underwhelming," Sakura said dejectedly.

"Wait," Naruto said, "isn't that the latest Icha-Icha you're reading?"

"You shouldn't know what this is," the Jonin replied with a disapproving look.

"You're kidding, right?" Naruto grinned. "I have the entire collection. The Super-Ultra-Limited-Platinum Collector Edition."

Suddenly Kakashi disappeared in a blur, reappearing behind Naruto and clapping a hand on the blonde's shoulder.

"T-the legendary illustrated edition?" the Jonin whispered, eye-wide. Naruto nodded, with a knowing grin. "It's almost going to be a shame to fail you guys."

"... what?" the trio of ninja deadpanned at the non-sequitur.

"Oh? You didn't know? Of the twenty-seven graduates only nine wild become Genin. The rest will be sent back to the academy. You all have to pass your teacher's exam before actually becoming active ninja. It's a grueling test with a sixty-six percent failure rate."

"YOU CAN'T DO THAT!" Naruto raged. Similar emotions were reflected on his teammates' faces.

"I can and I will. Show up tomorrow at dawn on Training Ground Fifteen. Don't eat, or you might end up vomiting."

Kakashi walked out laughing loudly, leaving behind three very stunned Genin.

Forget the next day; Naruto already felt like vomiting. All these efforts and he was still at risk of failing? This was the worst kind of nightmare.

-xXx-

**Three years earlier - Naruto: age thirteen.**

Nako was born, one day. Although Naruto could have picked an infinite amount of appearances, ultimately he wanted to be accepted as himself. He couldn't have that, not yet, so he settled for the next best thing.

Changing gender, he switched to what he thought he would have been if he were born as a girl. Removing the very distinctive whisker marks he turned into a little shorter female version of himself and promptly called herself Nako.

Some people might have noticed the resemblance but everyone knew he didn't have relatives and between waist-long hair, a c-sized bust and the reduced height from volume exchange needed to develop her breasts, no one was going to even make the comparison much less suspect a connection.

Finally confident with her new identity, Nako set out to make a new life for herself.

The results were not immediate, but they were still evident. People were kind to her, especially boys a little older than her.

Not having any real background to fall back on in her female form, she stuck with what she knew best: being a lonely orphan. She hung out with boys, mostly because the girls didn't seem to like her and were mean to her, while the boys were a lot nicer and bought stuff for her sometimes.

A guy once asked if he could touch her breast and Nako, not seeing anything wrong with that, agreed with a shrug. She didn't particularly like it or dislike it, but the boy bought her ramen afterwards so that was nice.

Words about it spread after the fact and more boys asked her if they could touch her breast or her butt in exchange for stuff. Naruto, who never had any friends before was more than happy to do something that simple to have finally get some. It never went further than the occasional grope, and Nako slowly grew accustomed to being touched even to the point of liking it a bit.

Inevitably, the rumors of a very open minded girl reached the ears of concerned parents who thought best to keep their children away from such a negative influence. The end result was that once more Nako was being avoided and glared at.

But there were exceptions to that. While kids were forbidden to interact with her and their parents made their displeasure known every time she was in sight, there was a portion of Konoha's citizens that took a shine to the odd girl. These people were mostly middle aged or even older men, who saw in Nako something they have been looking for: a brazen girl who that didn't mind their lecherous attention..

It was inevitable that things would escalate and eventually toppled. Finally, a fated meeting pushed Nako's life beyond the point of no return.

-xXx-

**Present day - Training Ground Fifteen.**

It was nighttime and most people were already back into their homes.

Not Naruto, though. The blonde-headed shinobi had ditched his usual orange jumpsuit in favor of clothes more fitting for a ninja operating in the dark.

He didn't know what his teacher's test entailed, but there was no way he was going to fail it. He didn't mind playing dirty in order to win. Besides, using every dirty trick available was one of the first things he was taught by the old man... and by _him_.

So Naruto went out at night with a shovel and a bag of stuff on his shoulders. He spent three long hours digging holes to lay traps and to hide stashes of tools. There was no way he could put up a trap under a Jonin's watch, but if the trap was already there it was another matter entirely. Maybe Kakashi wouldn't get caught in them, actually that was rather improbable, but if they slowed him down even just a little bit that could made a huge difference in the final outcome.

That took care of phase one. Phase two was more elaborate.

He put his fingers in a cross-shaped seal and a moment later there were two of Naruto standing there.

"Alright," one of told the other, "you know the drill."

The other nodded and jumped into the forest, disappearing among the woods. Phase two was afoot. Now he would better get some sleep otherwise he'd be too tired to do anything at all, plans or no plans.

Unbeknownst to him, an eyes with swirling tomoe observed him work all the time, leaving only after the blonde had returned home.

-xXx-

**The next morning - Training Ground Fifteen**

The three Genin gathered at the entrance of the training ground. Sakura looked like she hadn't been sleeping at all; Naruto's eyes were a bit red and he was yawning, but he otherwise didn't look particularly affected by the short sleeping hours, while Sasuke was his usual self.

Kakashi was late. Half a hour later he still hadn't showed up.

"You think this could be a part of the test?" Sakura asked after a while.

"Hn," Sasuke replied. "I don't think so."

"I'm getting some rest," Naruto announced and promptly lay on the grass, hands behind his head. A moment later, Sasuke noticed, Naruto's breathing was that of a sleeping person.

Either the boy was a master actor or he was actually asleep. Sasuke wasn't sure what he liked better: that his teammate could realistically fake being asleep or that he could actually sleep under duress.

Another hour went by and finally Sakura's stomach gave a long, pitiful growl.

As if that was the cue he was waiting for, Kakashi appeared among them with a shunshin.

"Hello, guys," he greeted casually.

"YOU'RE LATE!" Sakura yelled angrily.

"Meh?" Naruto said waking up. "Oh, Kaka-sensei. Finally, let's get this thing started," he declared, jumping to his feet.

"Maa, you seem awfully enthusiast for someone who was sleeping just a moment ago."

"Ah," the blonde scoffed, "you know what they say, don't let the enemy pressure you into anything."

"So, I'm the enemy?"

"You are the current obstacle between me and my ambition, so yeah, you are."

"Hmm... cheeky little brat. Well kids, here's the deal," Kakashi pulled out two bells from a one pocket, "what you have two do is get one of this bells away from me. You get one of these and you pass."

"But... there are only two bells, Sensei," Sakura pointed out the obvious.

"Yes, I'm sure you can imagine what it means to be left without one, hmm?"

_Failure_, everyone thought silently.

"You have all day to get them. Show me what you've got."

Taking that as their cue to start, Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura leapt away from the Jonin and disappeared among the foliage. The Jonin, on his part, leaned against a nearby tree and pulled out his favorite orange book and was soon giggling at its contents.

Naruto observed from his hiding place for a while, but Kakashi didn't move from his spot. Of course, he didn't have to. He didn't have to do anything until they made their move.

Easier said than done. The guy was perhaps the best Jonin in the entire Land of Fire. It was preposterous that a Genin, no matter how skilled, could get away with anything against him.

But what about three Genin together? Hmm.

Meanwhile Sasuke was having similar thoughts. Working together was absolutely necessary at this junction. Sasuke knew he was good, but he wasn't so delusional as to think he was anywhere close to an experienced Jonin like Kakashi. That, and the fact that this test made no sense. Twenty seven people had graduated from the Academy, but only nine would become active ninja. Kakashi said so himself. Teams were made of teams of three plus their Jonin. That mean that no matter how it went, in order to keep that ratio, it was impossible to fail arbitrarily a single Genin. The test was made to pass or fail teams as a whole. This wasn't a trial of skills, or at least not only that. It was a test to see if the prospective ninja were able to put aside their own personal stakes for the sake of the mission.

So having just two bells was a mean to sow discord. Now that this much was clear, the next order of things was getting his teammates to cooperate with him.

Sakura, despite her earlier misgivings of being just a fan-girl, was chewing on a couple of energy bars she had brought with her. _'Don't eat because you might end up vomiting, my ass_,' she thought spitefully. She went along with that counsel because it could have been a genuine one, but no one forbid her from taking something to eat with her. On a good day, energy bars tasted like wet cardboards but they did their jobs. No way she would have been able to last a whole day and also fight her prize off a Jonin on an empty stomach. The silver haired bastard didn't know the first thing about her if he thought she'd fall for that cheap trick. She wasn't the greatest fighter and she didn't have much chakra, but her mind was second to no one. She'd beat this task and then she and Sasuke would walk toward the sunset and their future together. And if her theory about the exam being a test of teamwork other than skills was wrong, Naruto would just have to suck it up and go back to the Academy again.

On cue with that thought the bushes behind her rustled, Sakura spun and found the aforementioned blonde staring at her.

"Psst. Sakura-chan," he called, "over here."

"Naruto? What the hell are you doing?" she hissed back.

"We need to talk. Do you have any idea where Sasuke could be?"

"Right here, Idiot," the voice of Sasuke called from the trees up above. The raven haired ninja fell and landed smoothly right beside his blonde teammate.

"I suppose you have figured it out already," Sasuke said, "the actual test is-"

"Team aptitude," the other two filled in.

"Good, then we are on the same page. Have either of you made any plans yet?"

"As a matter of fact, I did," Naruto replied.

"Is this about those traps you prepared all over the ground last night?"

"Yeah -_wait_. How do you know about that?"

"I've been meaning to do the same and I found you doing it yourself."

"And it didn't cross your mind to help me?" Naruto asked with a ticking vein across his forehead and a shaking fist.

"You looked like you had everything well in hand," Sasuke shrugged unrepentingly.

"You're a real bastard, you know that?"

"Naruto, don't call Sasuke like that!" Sakura exclaimed.

"Oh, just stop it, Sakura-chan. We all get that you like the Bastard but nobody likes a sycophant. Besides he's a bastard and he knows it."

Sasuke, nodded in agreements on both accounts.

"Right, even the Idiot gets it. Haruno, I'll make it clear. I'm not interested in you nor anyone else. To me there only two kinds of people worthy of notice: allies who help and enemies who hinder me. Everyone else is irrelevant. Choose yourself which one you'd rather be."

"A- alright," Sakura stuttered, her rant against Naruto effectively silenced."A-allies it is"

"Good. Now, what do either of you think should be our first move? Naruto?"

"I have a few aces up my sleeve, but this is Kakashi of the Sharingan we're talking about. He's not going to fall for anything we're going to do unless he allows himself to. "

"I agree," Sakura said having recovered from her earlier embarrassment. "He must have decided beforehand to limit himself to a certain point if he wants to test us. If he made it actually impossible for us to retrieve those bells, the entire test would be pointless."

"So we need to test how high he set that bar. Very well, I volunteer to find out."

"Seriously, Bastard? He's going to beat the shit out of you."

"True, but unless either of you has been holding back at the academy," both teammates shook their heads, "then I'm the only one that's going to last more than a minute in a one on one confrontation. He's not going to kill me, so I will recover from anything he's going to do. Watch our fight and come up with a plan or a dozen."

"Understood, Sasuke-kun. Trust me."

"Hn," Sasuke grunted at Sakura's pledge. He'd trust her only after he had seen how well she would do.

"Cheer up, Bastard. Your sacrifice won't be in vain."

"It better not or it's your hide I'll be coming for, Idiot."

The three Genin went their separate ways, two to find a decent observing position and the other to look for a smack down.

None of them noticed the Kage Bushin hiding in a tree, watching and listening in silence, nor they heard the sound if it dispelling and therefore sending all it had learned to the real Kakashi.

Back in the clearing Kakashi gave away nothing, but inwardly he was somewhat impressed with the three Genin. They had realized a great deal of its intentions independently and they sought each other on their own. True, their reason was the accomplishment of the mission and not the well being of each other but true friendship for a ninja was forged in the flame of common adversities. That they were able to at least understand that they would not succeed on their own was something no other Genin team he evaluated before them had been able to do.

Still, they would get nowhere if they didn't get those two bells from him.

He was almost eager to see what they would be able to do together, but he also didn't mind see what the hailed Rookie of the Year, now standing before him in the clearing, would be able to do on his own.

"Hello there, Sasuke-chan. Are you ready for that beat down Naruto warned you about?" he asked, not bothering to hide his knowledge of their plans.

Sasuke on his part didn't express any frustration, but instead dropped into a Taijutsu stance. Kakashi eye-smiled at him and then moved out of the flurry of kicks and punches unleashed by the Genin.

Taking advantage of an overextended blow, Kakashi grabbed Sasuke and lazily threw him toward the nearby stream .Sasuke's body hit the water... and slid upon it as he rolled to his feet.

_'Water-walking fresh out of the Academy? No wonder they call him a genius,'_ Kakashi said to himself, mildly impressed with Sasuke prowess. _'But that's not going to cut it.'_

To begin with, Kakashi decided to hold himself at a level where it would take all three Genin to get the bells. Granted, Sasuke was good enough to make the cut on his own, but there was no point to the test if Kakashi allowed that. Although, he admitted privately, it was an accomplishment in and of itself that he was forced to reconsider the amount of effort required to properly gauge them. That was already twice in a few minutes that they had surpassed his expectations. It was turning out to be fun, after all.

In the meantime, Naruto and Sakura watched Sasuke's impressive display. The Bastard asked if they held back during the academy, but it was him in the first place who had been hiding his skills. Although she would not voice it, Sakura agreed with Naruto: Sasuke was indeed a bastard.

And she liked him all the more for that.

But that was a thought for another time. Now she had to focus on the ongoing fight, trying to see patterns or self-imposed limitations on Kakashi. Sasuke was keeping him actually busy. After the initial exchange Kakashi had to put away his perverted book and fight with all four limbs. Maybe sending Sasuke to gauge Kakashi hadn't been that brilliant of an idea. Kakashi had obviously stepped up his game in response to Sasuke's ability. Now that trump card was lost and they would have to make do with something else.

A blur of motion caught her eyes. Naruto shot out of the three in direction of the battle. That idiot. Something like that wouldn't work.

Kakashi had seen Naruto coming a mile away. As a matter of fact he knew where he was hiding in the first place. He was no sensor, but he was a decent tracker and even without the Sharingan he could tell when someone was actively using chakra in his proximity, just as he could empower his own hearing enough to pick up hushed conversations between three inexperienced Genin. Kage Bushin was just overkill in that regard.

Naruto sent flying a handful of kunai with more accuracy Kakashi expected of him. Nothing exceptional but also not something he'd would have thought Naruto capable of, especially considering his academy records.

What impressed him was not so much that he was trying to hit him, but rather that he was trying to limit his possible ways to dodge Sasuke's attacks. Hmm, not bad for an improvised team work, but not enough to win the day either. Better teach them right then and there that no credits are due for partial answers. He grabbed hold of Sasuke's shirt and punched the wind out of him. Sasuke's eyes bulged out of his head and he collapsed, then he Kawarimi'd away, leaving a log in his place. Kakashi turned to face Naruto, only to find him just as gone. Kakashi blinked in surprise. That had been unexpectedly smart of him.

Oh well, he guessed, back to Icha-Icha it was.

-xXx-

"Bwargh!" Sasuke emptied the contents of his stomach. Maybe, he considered, Kakashi suggestion of not eating hadn't been just a trap after all.

"There, there," Naruto patted his back. "Let it all out."

Sasuke swung his arm to get rid of the annoying dobe. Naruto jumped away cackling madly.

"Fuck off, Idiot," the Uchiha grunted.

"Sasuke-kun, are you okay?" Sakura asked, dropping beside him.

"I had worse," he replied, having regained his bearings. "So? Have you come up with anything?"

"Just one thing," the pinkette replied. "Sensei is going to adjust strength to whatever we're going to bring to bear. I think he wants us to surprise him instead of overpowering him."

"Considering that there isn't a chance we can overpower him for real, I say that's true," Sasuke agreed sourly.

"I have a plan," Naruto said.

"What is it?" Sasuke asked eagerly.

"I can't say it. Kakashi is surely going to listening on us. If I say anything he'll know right away."

"How do you expect us to follow a plan we don't even know?"

"You must trust me and follow my orders to the letter."

"You're asking for a lot, Idiot."

"I know, but we all have everything to lose here, so you can trust my commitment."

"Hn," Sasuke replied, not at all convinced.

"I'm in," Sakura said after a moment of pondering. "Sasuke-kun, Naruto has shown to be better that we gave him credit for. If he says he has a plan, I'm willing to trust him."

"... really?" the Uchiha asked, surprised by Sakura's vote of confidence.

"I have to. If we win, we're going to be teammates for a long time. We'll have to trust each other unconditionally sooner or later. If Naruto says he knows what's he doing, then I'm going to believe in him."

The blonde was stunned speechless. It wasn't the first time someone told him they believed in him, but it still shook him to the core to hear those words spoken with sincerity.

"Thanks," he whispered, uncharacteristically subdued.

Sasuke pondered Sakura's words. To a boy whose family had been slaughtered by his own older brother, trust was something difficult to come by. That's why he nodded in agreement.

"Alright," he said. "I'm going to trust you."

Yes, Itachi robbed him of the ability to trust easily, therefore trusting the idiot would be the first victory against his brother.

"Alright then, let's go. Find a good observation spot and be ready to attack on my signal."

The other two Genin nodded one last time and leaped out of sight. Naruto turned around, blue eyes locking with another pair of the same color and then he was gone like the rest.

The person hiding it the woods waited until they heard the sound of a Bushin being dispelled and still waited another ten minutes for good measure, then they left their hiding spot as silently as possible.

-xXx- -

One hour had come and gone and everything lay still on Training Ground Fifteen. Kakashi was beginning to think his prospective students had given up, if it wasn't for the fact that he was acutely aware of their stares. What were they waiting for? Naruto said he had a plan but the blonde never moved from his hiding spot . He hoped for them they weren't expect him to drop his guard or, Kami forbids, fall asleep.

Similarly, Naruto's teammates were beginning to have thoughts similar to Kakashi's. If the Idiot's plan was waiting until Kakashi made a mistake out of boredom then he was stupid beyond their wildest dreams.

Naruto, on the other hand was the picture of calmness. Any moment now... there!

The sound of splashing water drew everyone's attention. A raccoon, of all things, was swimming downstream with a bunch of black clothes pinned in its jaw. It climbed out of the river, running past Kakashi and disappeared into the forest.

**"Hold it right there!"** a female voice echoed.

A woman swam downstream just as the raccoon had moments prior and pushed herself out of the water, showing to all the presents exactly whose clothes the animal had just run off with.

Her gaze met Kakashi's only visible eye and a moment of silence, broken only by the distant chirping of birds, ensued.

The buxom blonde was obviously a very young woman, seventeen or maybe eighteen at most, with long blonde hairs that reached all the way down to her back. The only things she had on herself were a Leaf Hitai-ate around her neck and a pair of black synthetic shorts that went covered her lower abdomen and a small portion of her supple tights.

"KYAAA!" she screamed a split second later, covering her chest with both arms and crouching to preserve what little was left of her modesty. "Don't look, pervert!"

Kakashi sighed. Really? Did they think such childish techniques would work on him? ... Wait.

One, two, three. His Genin hiding among the foliage were all accounted for.

His very sharp senses couldn't detect any form of chakra emission from the mostly naked girl. Yet, he couldn't just brush it off like that. He pulled up his Hitai-ate, uncovering his spinning Sharingan.

"I just told you not to look and you look more? **Super-pervert!**"

No, the Sharingan didn't lie. The woman in front of him was a person that looked exactly like that. No Genjutsu, Henge or any type of Bushin was in play; the Sharingan would see through it. He pulled down the Hitai-ate and relaxed against the tree.

"Miss, you are interfering with an official examination," he stated calmly. "You should leave immediately."

"I can't go anywhere like this," she protested. "I lost the pest that stole my clothes because of you!"

"Use a Henge."

"Ninjas will see through that and will force me out of it. Please, give me something to cover myself with. Lend me your jacket. Please."

Kakashi sighed and put away his book, then he slid out of his flak jacket, handing it over to the embarrassed woman.

"Thank you. Sorry if I called you a pervert I-"

"NOW!" a voice shouted and with it the three Genin jumped out of the woods, weapons bared.

A kunai flew from Naruto, but it wasn't aimed at Kakashi. It flew past him, buried itself in the woman's shoulder with a sprout of blood.

"Eeek," she screamed, dropping Kakashi's jacket.

"Everyone, stop right now!" the Jonin ordered sharply.

"Ignore him," Naruto counted instead. "That girl is his weakness, aim for her."

The other Genin seemed reluctant, but complied all the same. The middle of an fight is not the time to question a strategy, even if they didn't know what the strategy actually was.

"Tch!" Kakashi put himself between his Genin and the fallen kunoichi. Sasuke engaged him and again the Jonin had to fend off the Genin. Sakura went around him to strike at the girl. She wasn't reluctant in aiming for a bystander because she knew Kakashi was strong enough to prevent her from doing so. However, it wasn't Kakashi who she had to watch out for.

The nameless girl herself had pulled the Naruto's kunai from her shoulder and used it to deflect Sakura's strikes. A moment later, Kakashi's backward kick forced the pink haired Genin to roll away.

The Jonin was more than a little pissed off. They ignored his direct order and went as far as harm an outsider. Accomplishment of the mission didn't justify this behavior in non-critical circumstances. He was going to fail them so badly that they would have to repeat the Academy from year one. Right after he had beaten the stupid out of them, of course.

"Stay behind me," he told the girl, then he became a blur of motion. Sasuke fought back with his Sharingan, but Kakashi was far superior even with just his normal eye, with a person to protect and three Genin to fight off. Sasuke and Sakura ended up both pinned to the ground with their arms behind their back. The only one still free was Naruto, who kept himself at distance and fought with long ranged attack.

"You three," Kakashi growled. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Winning," the girl behind him whispered sultrily. Kakashi froze at feeling of sharp metal. He turned his head slowly, just enough to see the nameless girl with the kunai oh-so-conveniently provided by Naruto held in a reverse grip against his neck. She twirling something with a finger of her other hand. Something that looked suspiciously like his bells.

_'What the fuck?'_

"You lost, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto said smugly.

"You think that bringing in a stranger to help qualifies as a pass?" Kakashi growled, increasingly annoyed.

"Stranger?" the girl whispered in his ear. "From the beginning there were only four people here. Hatake Kakashi, Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura and lastly myself, Uzumaki Naruto."

Kakashi's eyes went to the orange-clad shinobi grinning madly in front of him; the same shinobi who disappeared a moment later with a pop and a puff of smoke.

"Kage Bushin?" Kakashi asked, shock dripping into his voice despite himself. He was completely at loss for words. Obito's Sharingan failed him, his experience failed him. He went nearly all out against three Genin and he still got fooled all the same.

"Impossible," he finally decided. "Even disregarding the fact that you know a S-Ranked Kinjustu like the Kage Bushin," he said causing Sasuke's eyes to widen at the mention of such a powerful technique, "I knew what the three of you have been doing all this time. When and how did you manage to make a copy without me noticing?"

"Last night," Girl-Naruto replied, kunai still held firmly against Kakashi's neck. "I've been hiding here since yesterday. The one who came here this morning was the clone I sent to pose as the real me. I made extra sure not to use any chakra to avoid detection."

"That's why you never engaged me directly," the Jonin observed, "a Kage Bushin would have been dispelled at slightest damage and the ruse would have been up. You even went as far as to wound yourself to keep me from suspecting any complicity. Well, you had me, fair and square," Kakashi admitted, letting go of his two captives. "You made excellent you use of teamwork, you trusted each other at a critical time and even managed to fool me entirely. That alone would have been enough proof to some, but don't let this go to your head. Anyway, congratulations are in order, you three are now officially Genin of Konohagakure-no-Sato."

"ALRIGHT!" Naruto and Sakura cheered loudly, while Sasuke's reaction was a just a faint, if satisfied smirk.

"Don't get too excited. You all showed lots of promise but that only means I'm going to run you even harder starting tomorrow. I'm going to make your life a living hell."

Kakashi was dead serious, they could tell, but even the promise of coming ordeals couldn't dampen their mood.

"Anyway, Naruto, What's is with that body? It's not an illusion of any sort. The Sharingan would see through that. Is it a like a suit you wear? That's amazingly well done. Let me see it," the teacher said reaching for Naruto's chest, squeezing what he assumed to be a fake breast.

"Ahn!" Naruto moaned. "N-not so rough!"

Kakashi couldn't have let go of Naruto's breast faster if there had been an exploding tag on it.

"Naughty sensei," she whined, massaging the abused area.

"Bwah?" he said with his hand still up in the air. "That softness, that texture... it's real?"

"Mou!" she pouted. "Don't you know you need to be more gentle with a woman's body? Baka-sensei!"

"Naruto, you... you were a girl all along?"

"What!" the other two-thirds of Team Seven deadpanned. Sasuke too, like Kakashi, thought that Naruto was wearing something that looked like a woman's body until that moment.

"No," Kakashi amended a moment later, shaking his head. "I read all of your medical files. There's no way you could have managed to alter those. Yet... there is no doubt that body is real. A far-fetched as it may seem, Naruto have you found a jutsu that makes you actually change your appearance?"

"No~pe," she sing-sang cheerfully, "I haven't found any such thing. I made it myself. And it doesn't make me change how I look, it actually transforms my body outside and inside. Right now, I'm a fully functional woman."

"But that's impossible!" Sakura shrieked somewhere between shocked and outraged.

"Wanna check for yourself?" Naruto asked, cocking her hips and pulling suggestively the band of her very short underwear a little bit downward.

"That won't be necessary," Kakashi said, hastily putting up his hand to prevent things that would trouble his mind even further. There's just so much shit anyone can deal with in a single day, after all. "I think that for the time being we can all assume you're telling the truth. Can you go back to normal now, please?"

"What's not normal about me?"

"You are not girl," Sakura said matter-of-factly.

"Says who?" she pouted angrily.

"... Naruto, how long have you been living as a woman?" Kakashi asked, realizing that Naruto's relationship with the female body wasn't just a matter of having a unique technique.

"Hm? That's... more or less five years."

"Do you think yourself as a man or a as a woman?"

"Both," he replied without missing a beat. "Or neither if you think that being a man and being a woman are mutually exclusive. I don't think so, by the way," she added cheerfully.

"Alright," the increasingly weary teacher said, rubbing his eye."It's not really my business to question your preferences so long as they aren't cause of issues. Can you at least get dressed?"

"Sure, I hid a stash of stuff along with my traps yesterday."

"Ah, yes, about that," Kakashi said ominously, eye curving into a smile that had no cheerfulness about it. "You guys aren't leaving until you disarm everything. Can't have unsprung traps laying around, now can we? Don't even think about using Kage Bushin, Naruto. This is punishment for teasing your teacher."

With that, tree less than enthusiastic Genin went to disable several dozen traps under the merciless sun at noon.

"This is all your fault Naruto!"

"Whyyyy?

-xXx-

It was almost dawn when the three Genin, sore from hours of physical work, made their way home together.

"So... teammates."

"Hn."

"We're gonna rock! We actually managed to give pause to Copycat Kakashi. How cool is that?"

"Shut up, Idiot. I thought you said you didn't hold back at the Academy. What's with that S-Ranked Bushin and that transformation Jutsu? Why are you still looking like a girl anyway?"

"It's comfy," she replied. "And I didn't hold back. I always used the Kage Bushin because I have too much chakra to make normal clones. It's just that nobody ever noticed. And the Kage Henge is uselessin Taijutsu spars so I never needed to use it. It's great for a lot of stuff but nothing academy-related, so there!"

"How did you even got held back in any case?"

"How did you, Rookie of the Year?" Naruto shot back.

"... Fine. Fair point."

"Guys... and girl, calm down," Sakura tried to play peace maker. "We all have our secrets, but we're going to work together for a long time from now on. There's no need to rush into things with each other."

"She's right."

"Hn."

"Anyway, how about we're going to eat dinner together?" the pinkette proposed.

"I'll pass," Sasuke replied. "I had enough of the two of you for one day. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Don't be such a bastard, Bastard!"

Sasuke flipped him the middle finger and disappeared in direction of his Clan's compound.

"He definitely likes us," Naruto told Sakura once the Bastard was out of ear-shot.

"The middle finger is a sign of being liked to you?"

"Have you ever seen him doing anything besides ignoring everyone? He acknowledges us. That's a start."

"You sure are an optimist," Sakura sighed, not sharing Naruto's enthusiasm in the slightest. "Anyway, Naruto can I ask you a question?"

"Sure, I guess."

"Since you are, you know both a man and a woman do you... like boys or girls?"

"Well, men are more passionate and straightforward, which is nice, but women are softer and usually last longer."

"If you put it like that it sounds like you're talking about _that_."

"That?"

"You know… sex."

"Well yeah. Why? What did you think I was talking about?"

Sakura blushed an unhealthy shade of scarlet.

"Are you saying you have been... doing it?"

"Doing what?"

"S-s-sex!"

"Yes, of course I have," Naruto furrowed her brows. "Is there a problem with that?"

"I... Just what are your feelings for Sasuke? You are the one who got along with him better at the Academy. Are you trying to-"

"Do you... do you think I want to steal him away from you?" Naruto burst out laughing, holding her stomach. "I have no intention of making a move on him, Sakura-chan. Besides, I'm sure he thinks of me more or less as a freak right now, just like you do."

"I-I didn't say anything of the sort."

"You didn't have to. Your eyes when you look at me speak for themselves. That's fine, though. My ambition is to make people acknowledge me as I am. Eventually I will have you acknowledge me as well."

"I... goodnight Naruto-kun."

"Goodnight, Sakura-chan. I'll see you tomorrow."

Naruto watched Sakura disappear with bitterness. Well, she knew from the beginning that it wasn't going to be easy. To be honest, it went better than she thought. Kakashi didn't seem to care much about his personal life, Sasuke cared only that she was strong enough not to hold him back and Sakura, despite her clear dislike for Naruto's circumstances was willing at the very least to look past them. Considering that they were the first people she told her first secret willingly, it was a promising start, all things considered.

* * *

**Last edit: 01/27/15**


	4. The simplest things (IV)

**Chapter 4  
The simplest things are the most beautiful (IV)  
****or: How I learned to love the Henge-no-Jutsu (IV)**

* * *

The day after the test, Team Seven gatherer at the training grounds. Except their teacher, that is. None of the Genin were particularly surprised, as it seemed that it was Kakashi's style to be punctually late. They still didn't know if he was always watching them in secret during that time, or if he just used that doubt to nick away from his duties.

None of the Genin cared all that much, anyway. Two hours after the appointed time, the Genin were keeping themselves busy. Sakura was reading from a scroll, a male Naruto was doing the tree-walking exercise while the last Uchiha practiced with some D-Rank Ninjutsu.

"You're putting too much chakra into it, Idiot."

"No kidding, Bastard," Naruto replied, flipping down from the tree where he left an indentation with his foot. "What do you think is my problem? I have too much fucking chakra."

"Oh, you poor little thing," Sakura said mockingly from her sitting place. Being the team member with the least chakra of all, she was quite sore on the subject.

"Hey," Naruto protested, "that's not fair Sakura-chan. Everyone know it's easier to build chakra reserves than control."

"Naruto is correct," Kakashi said appearing with a Shunshin.

"You're late," the three intoned, sounding more bored than annoyed.

"And a good morning to you too, my cute little Genin," Kakashi eye-smiled. "Building control is far harder than increasing chakra capacity, Sakura. It's a matter of skill versus power. A skill is always harder to master, but it's also far more fearsome."

"Fat lot of good that does," Sasuke said unimpressed, "if you can't use that hard-earned skill for more than a minute."

"Ah. Of course an Uchiha wouldn't see it that way," Naruto snorted. "Someone who can gain a skill just by looking at it once can't understand how difficult it is for us mere mortals to keep up."

"You're right, I don't care how difficult it is. I only care that you do keep up, Idiot."

"Say that to my face, Bastard!" Naruto growled.

"Gladly!"

"Children," Kakashi sighed. "Behave!"

"Tch," Naruto and Sasuke both scoffed, returning to their self-appointed tasks.

"See Sakura," Kakashi continued. "You have the potential to become the most deadly ninja of the three of you."

"Really?" Sakura asked in disbelief.

"Yes, Sasuke is a genius but being a genius can also make you blind. Naruto has probably more chakra than anyone else in the Elemental Nations, but it comes with the price of making very slow progress. You on the other hand are a blank slate. You don't have a particular flaw but you have the most sought out talent outside of a Kekkei Genkai: absolute chakra control.

"I- I never saw it like that," she stuttered. "Do you really mean it?"

"Of course I do. Cute little Genin like you often focus on the flashy jutsu, but more things have been accomplished with precision and stealth than they have with explosive battles. You, more than anyone else, have the predisposition to become the 'perfect kunoichi'.

"Way to go, Sakura-chan!" Naruto cheered pumping his fist, losing what little control he had achieved in the process and crashing on ground. Sasuke scoffed, unconvinced by Kakashi's description, but his Sharingan eye still went over Sakura's form a couple of times, revaluating her worth as a ninja.

"Now, don't think it's going to be easy. Your training is going to be the trickiest of all. Increasing your chakra without losing any of your excellent control is going to be a real challenge. You'll either become a legend or a complete failure. There's not going to be any middle ground for you. Think about it for a while. If you decide to go for it, I'll need nothing less than your absolute commitment. No fan-girl shenanigans. Get your priorities straight if you want to make something out of yourself."

Sakura gulped and nodded. Her eyes went to the raven-haired shinobi busy with his Ninjutsu. He made perfectly clear what his own priorities were. Avenging and restoring his clan. He'll need a strong Kunoichi to do the latter, wouldn't he?

Kakashi went to Naruto, who had picked himself up from the ground and had started climbing up the tree again.

"You already know what you need. Greater control is a must for you. I won't lie, you can become a real powerhouse in the future, but you are going to have the hardest time, not just compared to your teammates, but to just about any other ninja out there. Your other _skill-set_ is interesting and it deserve to be understood fully. We'll go over it later, in detail. In the mean time, stick to control exercise.

"Got it!" Naruto replied, snapping a salute, again falling to the ground from the loss of focus.

"And finally there is you," Kakashi went to Sasuke. "What is there to say? The title of genius in not misplaced with you, but that comes with its own downsides."

"Those being?"

"Arrogance and overconfidence, usually but that's not your case, isn't it? _He_ saw them beat out of you quite thoroughly, after all." The Sharingan spun and glared hatefully at Kakashi, who just smiled like the innocent soul he never was. "And then there are those eyes. Wonderful thing, the Sharingan, but it comes with a curse of its own."

"Enough riddles. If you've got something to say, out with it."

"Blindness, Sasuke-chan. We you can see everything you lose sight of what matters most. They say I have copied over a thousand jutsu and they are correct for the most part, but do you know how many of those jutsu I actually use? About a dozen, tops. And most of them I learned before I got my hands on this," he tapped his Hitai-ate, beneath which his Sharingan lay dormant. I use this gift mostly to counter the tunnel effect during high speed movements or to see through high level Genjutsu."

"What is the counsel of a thief worth, anyway? Do you think you know the Sharingan better than an Uchiha does?"

"Well," Kakashi stroked his chin thoughtfully, "if we were to take survival rate as the scale of measure of one's knowledge, I'd say that most Uchiha know jack shit these days."

Sasuke's angry fist missed Kakashi's face by a solid inch, then the world spun and the teen found himself with his back on the floor and his head pounding painfully.

"It looks like I was mistaken. You've still got plenty of arrogance in you. Here's what we are going to do. I'm going to finish what your brother started and smack that ridiculous pride out of you for good. And let me tell you one thing you might have missed in your anger at your brother. Your clan wouldn't have died at the hand of a single shinobi in they hadn't grown complacent with their own innate talents. If you ask me, your clan demise was more a case of mass suicide than of mass murder."

"Shut up," Sasuke growled hatefully. "What the hell do you know about that?"

"What I know is that I would have been able to do the same thing as your brother without using the Sharingan. Complacence is a sin with death in the ninja world. I won't and it doesn't excuse what your brother did, but the fate that befell your family was also one of their own doing. Trust me when I say that if you walk the same path, you'll meet the same end."

"What do I have to do?" the angsty teen asked between gritted teeth.

"Don't let the Sharing turn from the ace it's meant to be into a crutch. Use it when all else fail or you'll fail along with it one day."

Kakashi released the teen.

"I get it," Sasuke said, getting back on his feet, rolling his shoulders, "but Kakashi, one day I'll make you pay for what you said today."

"If you get to that point where you can back up those words, it'd be worth it," the teacher replied largely unconcerned. "Okay, let's start with appeasing in detail what each one of you can do. Sakura you're up first. Show me your Taijutsu."

Sakura got up, confidence bolstered by Kakashi's earlier words.

The day was spent testing them in turns on all aspects of the ninja arts. Sasuke was by far the most skilled in a straight up fight, with Naruto being a close second. The blonde on the other hand was leaps and bounds ahead of his peers when it came to stealth and unconventional tactics. The boy could think on his feet and had at least two backup plans for any situation. No wonder he gave the Chūnin around Konoha so much trouble with his pranks.

Sakura was unremarkable, even subpar in combat. Most teachers would consider her a nearly lost cause, but Kakashi knew a diamond in the rough when he saw it. Being book smart in the ninja world didn't sound like much, but no idiot ever made the cut for Jonin or even just Chūnin. If they were to be tested now, Sakura was the only one with a sliver of hope of getting a promotion. After all, a leader that doesn't know what they are getting into it's a leader of soon-to-be-dead subordinates.

All in all, Kakashi was impressed. It wasn't everyday that a ninja with a high potential came out of the academy, much less three of them on the same team. Two of them also had the natural drive to make the long run, while the third needed to be given that motivation more than she needed training. In any case, if they survived the profession long enough they would not doubt make it to the top of the ninja world. It was Kakashi's job to see to it that they would.

The sun begun to set and Team Seven begun trudging back to the Village proper with different degrees of tiredness. Well, that word wasn't really applicable to Naruto. The kind of strain Kakashi put them through during the day classified as light activity for the blonde shinobi. He could very well have just woken up from a refreshing nap.

"Alright," Sakura said. "Who's up for dinner?"

"I met my quota of team play for the day," Sasuke replied, turning for his Clan compound.

"Sorry, Sakura-chan. Since we finished early enough I think I'm going to turn up at my part-time job."

"You have a part time job, Naruto?"

"Well, as a orphan with no family I had to make ends meet somehow. Gotta run, now. I still have to get home and get changed. I'll see you guys tomorrow."

Naruto sped away, leaving Sakura alone with Kakashi.

"Maah. So energetic. Well, I'll take up on your offer Sakura. Since I'm the teacher it's on me this time."

"So you aren't a jerk all the time, Sensei."

Kakashi laughed. "I'm going to make you regret those words tomorrow."

"What if take back what I said?" she asked in her best 'pretty please' voice.

"Too late. Come, I know a good place to eat."

-xXx-

Into a empty alley, Naruto changed into Nako. The place where she was going wasn't associated with the Jinchūriki in the citizens' mind. While he still had the rundown apartment the Hokage gave to him, Naruto hadn't actually lived there for years. He sent a clone every now and then to keep up the pretense that he still did, mostly so that people wouldn't wonder where he actually went.

Thanks to his part-time job, Nako could afford a much better apartment than Naruto ever could on his meager orphan stipend. The buxom bombshell rented a place in the middle-class part of town. Truthfully she could afford much better with what she made as the top girl of Konoha's best house of pleasure, but Miwako advised her against it. Wealth attracts unwanted attention and Nako would have better use for her money in times such as this, when her job as a ninja didn't pay enough to maintain her lifestyle while it also detracted from her time to work as pleasure girl. In all likelihood she wouldn't have any money to waste unless they started taking at least C-Rank missions weekly. The pay from day long D-Rank mission, split between the three of them didn't come close to her hourly fee at Velvet Room.

As a full-fledged ninja she also lost her right to an orphan's stipend, so she would have been quite down the drain without her job and those savings.

She reached her apartment, a cozy place with two bedrooms, a kitchen, a sizable living room and a spacious bathroom. She took a shower to get rid of the smell of sweat from the day's activities. Surprisingly, the ability to change one's body at will didn't do much to keep her skin soft and her hair smooth. She had to work on those the old fashioned way with expensive shampoo, skin-creams and perfumed oils. Although she could avoid growing body hair she didn't want to cheat in being a woman, so she took care of that like any other woman did. Unless she really was short on time, that is. Two hours later, with the sun completely gone and the moon shining on Konoha, Nako left her place donned in her luxurious kimono and headed for her workplace. Since she didn't know beforehand whether she could show up or not, she didn't have any reservation for the night. That only meant that she would make someone unexpectedly happy for once.

The night was quiet. Nako saw the occasional ninja patrolling from rooftops. A few of them threw her a casual glance before continuing on their way while other gazes lingered a bit more. Nako took them in stride, enjoying them while they lasted. There was power in being the object of someone's desire, Miwako taught her that as much. Kakashi too said something along those line. There is skill and there is power. And then there's the power that comes with a skill. What Nako did for a living could be as powerful and deadly as any other jutsu. And just like any other jutsu there was an unadulterated sense of accomplishment that came with it.

She knew what people like her, who enjoyed having sex with anyone at anytime, were called. Whores or sluts.

Nako didn't understand how something that felt good for all parties involved was being looked down upon, while the violence that sometimes came with being a ninja was instead highly praised. Was there something wrong with everyone but her?

Well, not everyone was that crazy. Miwako, for instance shared her opinion.

Then there were those people who were called perverts just because they knew what they liked and they weren't ashamed of it.

Yes, something was very wrong with the world but it wasn't her. That conviction was further reinforced by the fact that her male alter-ego was hated for something that wasn't his fault in the least. It was certain, the actual perverts were those who denied what they liked and spat upon those who didn't.

Well, good for her and too bad for them.

While she pondered about these deep thoughts, Nako had reached her workplace. There was a commotion going on in front of the Velvet Room. Quite unusual, considering that the amount of security around the place dissuaded troublemakers from showing up.

"I'm sorry, Shirota-dono," she heard Miwako's voice.

"Please," the balding, middle-aged man begged on the verge of tears, on his knees and with his arms held behind his back by the guards. "I've lost everything. My business, my home. I have nothing left, but I've been your customer for years. Please, just one night."

"I understand your plight but we are a business venture," Miwako replied, shaking her head. "If you don't have any money we cannot service you."

"What's going on here?" Nako asked, approaching the scene.

"Oh, Nako-chan, I didn't know you were coming. Don't worry about it, Shirota-san fell a bit on hard times and can no longer afford our services despite his insistence."

Nako knew Shirota only in passing. The man was (used to be apparently) a merchant of some success but as it sometimes goes in the business his luck turned around. Even at the top of his wealth he couldn't have afforded a night with Nako without at least reconsidering his future investments. The man was now staring pitifully at the ground, broken inside.

"I'll take care of it," Nako said.

"Uh?" Shirota said, looking up at her without quite understanding what she meant.

"Nako-chan, you don't have to," Miwako protested.

"I know I don't, Mistress," she replied formally, "but I can't in good conscience deny a man who has been our patron for years like this. Isn't loyalty worth more than all the gold in the world?"

A murmur rose from the spectators.

"You won't receive any payment from this."

"I'm aware of that, Mistress. Come, Shirota-sama. Allow me repay the kindness you showed us over the years."

She extended him her hand and the man took it, caught in a daze, almost not believing that the most sought out woman in the red district was reaching out to him.

She couldn't take him inside the Velvet Room. What she did in her own private time was her business and couldn't affect her workplace. She led him instead in the direction of her home, disregarding the whispering of the onlookers. Whispers of jealousy, anger but also of admiration. The words _'Merciful Goddess'_ were threw around a couple of times. Nako didn't hear those, just like she didn't hear Miwako's words.

"_I won't turn anyone away," _the Mistress recited under her breath. "You really intend to live up to those words, Nako-chan?"

"Mistress, will it be alright?" one of the guards asked. "People are going to talk about this."

"Let them. Kindness is hardly bad advertisement. Come on, there's nothing to see here anymore."

In the meantime, Nako and Shirota had left the red light district and were almost back at her place.

"Thank you. Thank you," the man bawled, not quite believing his luck. For months he wished to hire Nako at least once, but the cost always made him reticent. In truth, more than once he hired a girl during a business trip just because she looked like Nako. "Never in my dreams I thought that someone such as you would ever..."

"Hush," she cut him off with a slender finger across his lips. "There is no need for words. If you truly are grateful, then show it to me."

She unlocked the door to her house and pushed him inside and from there to her room, where he fell on her soft bed. Nako joined him on the mattress, her lips finding his as he was barely getting to a seated position. He tasted like cheap alcohol and tears; the taste of a grown man's despair.

Nako wasn't bothered by that. She had known a despair of her own for a long time and for that time she wished for nothing but someone who'd give her respite from it. If she could save someone from the same darkness she would so without a second thought.

Her hands slipped inside his robes, pulling them open and revealing the chest of a man no longer in his prime. She kissed a trail from his lips to his belly, where she stopped. Then she pulled herself up and grabbed both of his hands, kissing the palms affectionately.

"Show me, Shirota-sama," she told him once more. Her words seemed to wake him from his daze, as his eyes focused on hers. He grabbed her shoulders and brought his mouth to hers again. Nako parted her lips and a moment later she felt him slip past the inviting opening. Their tongue danced a slow, steamy dance, while Shirota's hands found their way into her kimono. He pulled it apart, freeing her voluptuous breast from its confinement and proceeded to kneed it with the all skillfulness developed over the years, much to the blonde's delight.

"Shirota-sama," she said breathily, pulling their lips apart. Her eyes were slightly glazed and her pink nipples were hard under his thumbs. As of that moment, the enraptured former businessman realized one important thing: she was the real thing. This wasn't a woman who sold her body for money or for pleasure. She was a lover, a lover for hire but a lover nonetheless. And this lover had took pity on him on his lowly self and took it upon herself to console him.

Right there and then, Shirota fell in love for the first time in his forty years of life.

He pushed her down of the mattress and she offered no resistance. Her arms sprawled to her side but her legs were closed tight. Not as a rejection, her utterly pleading eyes told otherwise, but an invitation to be proactive, to spread them apart on his own strength and conquer the treasure waiting from him beyond those gates. Shirota's erection couldn't get any harder without literally exploding. There was no longer trace of the whimpering man of a few minutes earlier. In his place there was now a predator with eyes set on its prey. This was the power that Nako had achieved. To make and unmake a man or a woman at will by taking manipulating their desires.

Shirota pried her legs open and dove face first between them, seeking the sweet spot he lusted for and found it brimming with delicious nectar, which he drunk like a man who had wandering for weeks in the desert of Suna.

Nako, whose legs and waist were firmly held in place by Shirota's hands could only squirm under the onslaught of the man's tongue over her most private place. Her body was on fire, every nerve had come to a life of its own. If people looked down on this feeling they were utter fools.

She grabbed his head, forcefully pushing in further into her nether regions. "Shirota-sama! Shirota-sama!" she squealed. "You're driving me crazy!"

For a time seemingly immeasurable, Nako's body twisted in the man's grasp, until with a last shriek her body shook a final time. Her back arched as her womanhood quivered in blissful release. Her body then slumped, void of all strength. Shirota in the meantime emerged from his newfound oasis. Somehow his member had gotten free and was now throbbing violently in anticipation. Nako stretched her arms toward him invitingly.

"Come," she told him. He nearly did at just the loving tone of her voice. Never in his life he heard a voice so genuinely full of love. She was a Goddess. That concept was now firmly embedded in Shirota's mind. And like the Goddess she was he would worship her to his dying breath.

He pushed his member against her wet slippery entrance, pushing past her outer lips and piercing the smoldering hotness inside. Whatever was left of Shirota's mind melted right then, leaving only the animal that lives inside every man, and that animal proceeded to devour Nako thoroughly. Nako, on her part, was more than glad to be devoured like that. For all of his professional shortcomings, Shirota knew what he was doing in bed. If age gave him anything over younger men was the skill that came with experience.

She matched his tempo as much as her laying position allowed her to. The sound of flesh hitting flesh and their throaty moans and grunts filled the room like a symphony.

Still, Shirota was fighting a losing battle against his own passions. The increasing rhythm of his thrusts belied the approaching of his climax and he was aware of that. At the last moment, he pulled back, but he found himself blocked by Nako's legs.

"Inside," she moaned, forcing him to stay inside her womanhood. "I want it."

Shirota lost it. With a few final thrusts of his hips he released his seed deep inside the beautiful young woman, who in turn climaxed from the warmth of his semen filling her most precious place. She dug her nails into his back, arching once more her back like a bow close to snapping. Her legs, young and powerful, nearly broke Shirota's back from the force she used to keep him lodged inside her until he was done coming. Finally, she wrapped her arms around his back and brought him close for a last intense kiss.

They stayed like that for a while, with him on top of her and his still hard manhood buried into her folds. After he had regained his breath, Shirota started moving again into Nako. His throbbing erection hadn't subsided in the slightest.

"S-still..?" Nako gasped. Her body, still sensitive after her recent orgasms, felt the pleasurable friction inside her highly amplified.

"Sorry, I... I can't get enough of you."

"Please wait, Shirota-sama," she begged. "I'm too sensitive right now. If you move around I'm going to cum again right away."

"Then, I'll make you cum. Again and again until morning," he promised with a fire burning in his eyes.

"Noooh," she moaned, pleasure dripping in her voice. "If you do that, I'll break."

It was a lie, of course. As someone who has been trained in the arts of love-making by Miwako, Nako could give and receive much more pleasure than that. In fact, riding one orgasm into another was the very basis of what she had been taught. Shirota didn't need to know that. He needed to believe that she was at his mercy, that she was being controlled by his desire while the truth was the opposite. Her words had the intended effect. A beast seemed to wake inside him that had nothing in common with the defeated man from earlier.

"Then I'm going to break you!" he swore. "Break! Break! Break!"

Each repetition was marked by a solid thrust of his hips. He pulled one of her legs above his shoulder, to get further inside her. He kissed her leg and licked her bare foot, never stopping thrusting into her for a moment. Drowning in pleasure, Nako dug her fingers into the mattress beneath her.

"So… GOOD!" she screamed. "Shirota-sama! You feel so good inside me! More! Break me more!"

He laughed. The strong laugh of a man who doesn't doubt himself or his own worth. In less than a hour Nako had rebuilt a man's confidence from scratch.

"I'm going to come inside you again," he grunted. "Do you want that? Uh? Do you?"

"YES! Give it all to me! Your strong seed! Give it to ME!"

With a primal grunt, Shirota came, far more powerfully than he did earlier despite it being his second time. Nako's womanhood squeezed his member for all it was worth, driving every drop of his semen as deeply insider her as she could.

He collapsed on her again, both short on breath. Shirota could see now, why this girl was the most sought. No woman, rented or otherwise, ever made him feel so powerful and so wanted. It was intoxicating and he couldn't get enough of her.

"I'm.. I'm still hard," he confessed after awhile.

"Then... break me some more, please," Nako begged, trailing kisses along his jaw.

Shirota did keep up to his earlier promise. He was like a man who had found his youth again, and he was absolutely willing to spend it inside the young woman who helped him find it.

-xXx-

Shirota awoke in the morning. At first, he didn't quite realized where he was, then the events from the previous night came back to him

Nako was sleeping soundly with her head on his chest, looking as peaceful as ever.

Everything felt like a dream. Not the night before, but everything that lead to it. His business partner cheating him, taking all their money and disappearing somewhere, probably in Kumo, leaving him with nothing to his names but debts.

Yet nothing of that seemed to matter. The previous night filled him with vigor and hope. He wasn't some worthless scum. He made his own fortune once and he could make it twice.

He owned that renewed self-assurance to the young woman sleeping soundly in his arms. She, who owed him nothing, found into her to return his loyalty with her body. It was ridiculous if he thought about it. Brothels, no matter how fancy, were business ventures and no money meant no business. Yet, this woman went beyond the pettiness of a business transaction. She didn't offer her body but rather she shared her love through it. If even one such a person existed in this world, then it was worth it to start from scratch once again; because there were other things than money in the world; things that money couldn't buy either.

He owed to himself to find those things... and get back to being rich while he was at it.

On his chest, Nako mumbled and begun to wake.

"Hmm... morning," she said sleepily.

"Good morning, uh, thank you again for last night."

"I'm glad I could be of help. Besides, I enjoyed it too. My customers are always afraid of hurting me so they treat me like I'm made of glass. It's good to have it rough every now and then, so thank you."

"Err.. you're welcome, I guess."

"What time is it, anyway? Oh no, I have to get ready for work. Do you mind if I shower first?"

"No, no. This is your home, go right ahead."

"Thanks!" she jumped off the bed and went into the bathroom, completely at ease with her nudity. A moment later he heard them in the shower, and he took the opportunity to look around her house a little bit.

The place was clean and felt warm. The furniture was new, but not opulent. A few, tasteful decoration were placed here and there. It really looked like the house of an average girl, rather than the sleeping place of a high-class whore.

Then his eyes fell on it. A Hitai-ate of the Leaf. It was undoubtedly new and not the old memento of a relative. She… she was a kunoichi?

Never in his wildest thought he imagined being with a ninja. It's not like they were considered sacred or anything, but they were known to keep to themselves. If they slept around with civilians, they did it incognito. And now he was there, in a kunoichi's home, after having spent the better part of the night having steaming sex with her.

Was this part of a kunoichi's duty as well? Somehow he doubted it.

"Done!" Nako said walking out of the bathroom with a towel around her head and nothing else.

Startled, Shirota dropped her Hitai-ate, which bounced on the floor, catching Nako's eyes.

"Sorry," he apologized quickly, scurrying to pick it up. "I didn't mean to pry."

"It's fine," Nako laughed. "It won't break that easily, I hope."

"So... you're a ninja."

"Yes, I graduated just recently."

"I see. Is this... something all kunoichi do?"

"This?"

"I mean, working as pleasure girls."

"Ah, no. Well, some of us do, but it isn't required or expected," she shrugged, not at all uncomfortable with the topic. "There's plenty of information to be gathered in pleasure houses and sometimes infiltration missions require us to pose as prostitutes."

"So, your job at the Velvet Room is part of an assignment?" he asked, but what he truly wanted to know if sleeping with him was.

"No, silly," Nako laughed, genuinely amused. "I just graduated, didn't I tell you?"

"Ah, yes you did," the man admitted. "Look, can I ask you a question? Why did you sleep with me?"

"Well, we were already in the same bed..."

"No, no. I mean, why did you have sex with me?"

"Why wouldn't I? I mean was there any reason not to?"

"No but... well, uh, Is that enough?"

"Shouldn't it? Sex feel good, so isn't that enough reason to do it anytime you can? I wanted it, you really needed it and in the end we both enjoyed it, a lot I might add. Do you need more reasons than that?"

"So..- you would do it with anyone just because they look like they need it? Anyone at all?"

"Sure, why not? Unless I have more important things to do, or there a specific reason not to do it with someone, I'd have sex with anyone that comes asking."

"For free?"

"If I'm not on the clock," she laughed, "though I wouldn't say no if someone decided to pay me anyway."

"So if I were to come back another day would you...?"

"Of course, if you find me at home I'm almost always up to it. Don't be a stranger, okay? In fact, feel free to use the place until you get back on your feet."

"... Are you serious? I can stay here? As much as I want?"

"You bet. Okay, one rule. Do whatever you want in here, but don't touch the ramen. I mean it. If you touch my ramen stash I'll cut something of yours you wouldn't want me to cut. We clear?"

"I won't touch the ramen," the man promised, holding up his hands in surrender.

"Then we're good. I have to go now. I'll see you tonight then," she winked at him and went out of the door wearing a black ninja outfit.

Shirota stood in his place for many long minutes, trying to come to terms with the sudden turns of his life. He was brought out of his musing by a loud growl of his stomach. Thinking about it, it was more than two days since he last ate. With a bit of shame he decided to accept Nako's hospitality for the time being. He would of course repay her to the last Ryo once he'd get back on his feet.

He went to the kitchen and began looking for something to eat.

Five minutes later he came to a chilling realization.

"THERE'S NOTHING TO EAT BUT RAMEN IN THIS HOUSE!"

Maybe things weren't going to be so easy after all.

* * *

**Last edit: 01/27/15**


	5. The simplest things (V)

**Chapter 5  
The simplest things are the most beautiful (V)  
****or: How I learned to love the Henge-no-Jutsu (V)**

* * *

"Hokage-sama," Kakashi greeted as he slipped into his direct superior's office.

"Ah, Kakashi. Just the man I needed. So, how did you find your team?"

"Quite frankly, I don't think I've seen a group with so much raw potential since... Well, with the wisdom of hindsight, I would say not since my days with Obito and Rin."

"That's high praise coming from you. How would you rate them individually?"

"They all have their flaws, but they are nothing that can't be worked around... or through."

"Lesser people would find your words ominous," the Hokage laughed.

"With good reasons," Kakashi eye-smiled. "but honestly, giving them anything less than the harshest possible treatment would be making them and Konoha both a great disservice."

"You are their teacher," the Hokage acknowledged. "Just don't break them... too much."

"On a different subject, Hokage-sama, why wasn't I informed of Naruto's... exotic abilities? Why wasn't there any record of it in his file?"

"Ah, so he showed you the Kage Henge, I take."

"And the Kage Bushin," the silver haired shinobi nodded. "Did he really develop that transformation jutsu on his own?"

"It was a matter of dumb luck and sheer determination, rather than a spark of genius if that's what you're thinking. A reflection of how deep into a corner this Village had driven his Jinchūriki."

"As I thought... he sought a way to escape the fate of a Tailed Beast's host. Speaking of which, does he...?"

"Yes," the Hokage nodded. "I told him myself. "

"But why? I thought you wanted to shield him from the burden."

"I believe I made a mistake in that regard. Admittedly, I trusted the people I'm sworn to protect a bit too much. I forgot that sometimes the greatest threat to the peace of this Village is made by its own inhabitants. Naruto's current psychological situation is the result of my misgivings."

"You mean his dual gender? What's the story behind that?"

"Inoichi would rather tell you that Naruto is entirely dissociated from the concept of gender," the Hokage explained. "His ability to change at will during his formative years caused his psyche to develop in previously unexplored directions."

"Is he stable?" the silver haired shinobi asked worriedly.

"According to Inoichi, he is. Actually he's more stable than he would have been otherwise, I've been assured."

Kakashi flinched. "That bad?"

"Worse. That he felt compelled to become an entirely different person is a testament of how his original self has been treated."

"I don't recall he was ever involved in episodes of violence."

"You are old enough to understand that prolonged isolation and indifference can cause harm worse than sharp steel. Especially when there is no evident reason for it."

"So you told him about the Kyuubi."

"And about his parents."

"That couldn't have gone well."

"On the contrary, Kakashi-san. See that's what trouble me most. Naruto understood. He understood my reason not to tell him and his father's reason to do what he did."

"How is that bad?"

"I... forgive me. The truth is that I have not yet come to terms with how Naruto has grown to be. I see it as the result of my failure, so it annoys me that he's at peace with it. It's just my selfishness talking, really."

"Forgive me for asking this, Hokage-sama, but what do you mean by how Naruto has grown to be?"

"Hm, where I should I start?"

"The beginning would be a good place as any," Kakashi offered.

"No. No, I think that starting from the end would be best, in this case."

-xXx-

**Two years before - Naruto: age fourteen.**

"Hokage-sama," the Anbu said stepping into the office. "There's a situation."

The Hokage looked up from his paperwork, that even late into the evening seemed to increase tirelessly.

"What kind of situation?"

"Yamanaka-taichou did not share the information. He requires your presence at the Interrogation facilities immediately."

Sarutobi stood, alarmed. If one of his foremost intelligence officers asked for him without giving any detail then it was a matter of extreme importance. He left his office in haste after dismissing the masked operative.

"What's the matter?" he asked entering the room where Inoichi waited from him.

"Something unexpected came up during a domestic investigation," the blonde ninja replied. "We found that a group of merchants was selling sensitive information to Kumo and other nations."

"That is hardly unexpected, or a problem that requires my attention. Banish them from Konoha as per our laws."

"I have already seen to that. They have been notified to leave the Village within two days. No, the problem is this person we found with them."

Through a one-way mirror, Inoichi showed the Hokage a blond girl wearing a very short, very revealing kimono. Around her neck, wrists and ankles she had the usual chakra-restraining devices applied to all prisoners suspected to be foreign spies.

"Who is she?"

"Technically, no one since there is no record about her anywhere."

"A spy?" the Hokage's eyes narrowed.

"That's what I thought at first, so I took the liberty of using my clan's techniques on her."

"Don't dawdle. Who is she?"

"Uzumaki Naruto."

A moment of silence went by. When the Hokage spoke, his voice was tinged with annoyance.

"Inoichi, if you dragged me here at this ungodly hour for a prank because you lost yet another bet with Shikaku I swear to Kami-"

"I'm not kidding, Hokage-sama. She is Naruto."

"Naruto is most certainly a boy," he pointed out, increasingly annoyed.

"Nonetheless, that is Naruto."

The silence seemed to stretch eternally, heavy with implications.

"What happened to him? Could Orochimaru have -?"

"No. It's a jutsu he made for himself. His memories about the fact are quite clear. There's no possibility of tampering."

"What? How? Why?"

"The answer to those questions would be, in order, a Transformation Jutsu, sheer determination and lastly being an outcast Jinchūriki."

The Hokage flinched. He knew what Naruto was going through, what every Jinchuuriki was going through, because of their burden. Inoichi's wasn't an accusation, just an objective statement of facts. Still, the Hokage perceived it as a personal blow.

"What's his involvement with that group? Were they trying to smuggle him to another village?"

"Hokage-sama, I only wish it was that simple," Inoichi shook his head. "No, to the best of my knowledge they never tried something like that. If any of them was privy to Naruto's identity, they didn't show. Their interest was... Naruto here was... trained in the arts of _companionship_."

"You are not saying what I think you're saying."

"I'm afraid that I am. Hokage-sama, I-"

Inoichi choked on his words. The raw killing intent pouring out of the old man's body was suffocating. Inoichi hadn't seen such a display of quiet rage from the Hokage in a long time, and never out of the battlefield.

"Why, Inoichi, did you let a bunch of rapists get away with just a simple banishment?"

"Naruto wasn't... he wasn't coerced into it."

"Explain," the God of Shinobi ordered, killing intent not relenting in the least.

"Naruto wasn't... coerced. Ever. Manipulated, yes, but never forced. The person who taught him took advantage of his estrangement from society. Naruto has been taught to enjoy the things they did, even to seek them out of his own. No, even without their help Naruto was already well set on that direction."

"What his the extent of the damage?"

"There is no damage to speak of, Hokage-sama."

"Are you mad, Inoichi?" the Hokage's anger flared. "A boy has been made into a female...pleasure girl. How can you say there is no damage?"

"My liege. I understand where you're coming from but you are mistaken. Naruto is mentally stable. The only damage he ever suffered was emotional and it was prior to these events. As despicable as it is, what has been done to Naruto has made him into a far happier and balanced person."

"Inoichi, I'm warning you..."

"No! Hokage-sama, if you'd rather hear a comfortable lie please go seek it somewhere else. I saw into his mind. Naruto's life was nearly barren and void of any affection. He could very well have become a dangerous sociopath the way he was being treated."

"And do you think this is better, Inoichi?"

"From Naruto's perspective? Yes. I would those wring people's neck personally if I could, Hokage-sama, but if I have to be honest with myself I couldn't do that without doing it to you beforehand."

The killing intent evaporated like mist. The God of Shinobi vanished. In his place was left only an old man with too many years and even more mistakes on his shoulders.

"How foolish have I've grown to be? I should have learned my lesson with Orochimaru, yet I have sinned of excessive forgiveness and trust once again. Tell me Inoichi, what would you do in my place?"

"There's no going back from what has been done," the head interrogator admitted sadly, "but if he means anything to you, anything at all, then do right by him now."

A heavy silence fell between them. The Hokage gave a small nod and walked toward the cell where Naruto was being held.

For what it was worth, he would do right by him this time.

-xXx-

**Present time**

The Hokage fell silent. Kakashi had moved his Hitai-ate up so that he could massage both eyes.

"I'm not quite sure how I should deal with this," the copycat admitted. "I honestly don't know how to handle Naruto's growth in light of this information."

"There is no need for that. I... No. Shikaku, Inoichi and myself have found someone to oversee Naruto's unique situation. A kunoichi well-versed in the arts Naruto has been trained into."

"Are you saying that Naruto is still doing that?" Kakashi would have jumped to his feet if he wasn't already standing. "I thought you intended to rectify your mistakes, not further them, " in spite of himself, Kakashi's tone was furious.

"Don't believe for a moment that I didn't share your same thoughts. I still do for that matter, however Inoichi told me flatly that whether I liked it or not, Naruto has developed a very active sexuality. One that he would exercise and exploit on his own anyway. Shikaku insisted that looking the other way instead of channeling it productively, for Naruto's own sake, would be making him a disservice. I didn't want to agree, but I couldn't be a hypocrite any further. I've sent many kunoichi and a few suitably inclined shinobi to work in that field over the years and even fewer of them had Naruto's willingness to perform those duties. In light of that, what would _you_ have done?"

Kakashi was silent. The Hokage was correct, of course. Circumstances had brought Naruto to develop a set of skills that was better suited in the department of infiltration and information gathering through non-ordinary means. Kakashi too could see that, he was just having a hard time accepting that it was his own teacher's son who had to do it.

Both the Hokage and himself, he privately admitted, were just two huge hypocrites.

"I understand. What will you have me do, Hokage-sama?"

"See that Naruto's ordinary skills are up to par. It's no secret that his enormous chakra reserves are much of a hindrance as they are an asset. Also, instruct him to keep to his male persona while on duty unless told otherwise. His talents can be put to better use if a limited number of people are aware of them. He already owns a different set of IDs for his female self."

"You have been through, I see. Very well, I won't fail you, Hokage-sama."

"See that you don't, Kakashi. There is a storm brewing, the signs are out there. This illusion of peace won't last much longer. I will need every team, yours especially, to be ready for anything at any time."

Kakashi's eyes narrowed but he didn't ask anything . The Hokage would clue him in when the time was right, if necessary. Furthermore, Kakashi had no use for knowledge he didn't have to act upon. All he needed were the orders he had already received: shaping Team Seven to live up to its potential.

He had a number of ideas in mind. None of them pleasant in the least.

-xXx-

_Scrub. Scrub. Scrub._

Another bloodstain gone. Another house cleansed from the memory of a senseless slaughter.

For the past two years, Sasuke idea of relaxation was removing the trace of the massacre, as if wanting to erase it from history while waiting to erase its perpetrator.

He was nearly done as well. This was the last empty house he had to finish. Not that he planned to rent the place or anything. It was just a method to remember his purpose.

Uchiha Sasuke was not sane. No boy who had been forced by his eldest brother to witness the murder of their parents over and over again could ever be called sane.

All the counseling in the world could not fix that.

He had been declared stable and fit for duty, but his mind was no longer like that of his peers.

Revenge was his reason to get up in the morning, his reason to train until he could no longer move his body, his reason to breathe altogether.

He was broken and he knew it. He didn't care for it, but he was aware of his condition in a odd detached way.

It wasn't that he didn't care for anything, though. He would not allow himself to become emotionless, least he forget how bright his hatred burned. However, he needed to look at himself from the outside, or he risked losing himself to his own lingering madness.

He threaded daily on a very thin line. In many regards, Sasuke was similar to ninjas with many years of service on their shoulders. He had drive and focus that most Shinobi usually didn't develop until they were faced with Chūnin duties. Despite Kakashi's warning, Sasuke was leap and bound above his peers without taking into account his Uchiha blood and its legacy. He only lacked the actual field experience, but time would supply that, for sure.

In the meantime, he kept scrubbing, one stain after another.

Ironically, in the pursuit of his brother, he would spill far more blood than he'd ever get the chance to clean.

That too he didn't care for.

-xXx-

"I'm home," Sakura announced. A distant snore met her greeting.

Great, father was passed out drunk again and mother was out, probably beacuse she couldn't stand the sight of that waste of a human being.

Sakura paid them no attention, or at least as little as she could. It was a mutual behavior, after all.

She locked herself in her room and lay on her bed.

She made it. She actually managed to become a ninja. Sure, her relationship with Sasuke wasn't what she had hoped for, but she could work on that. At the very least, she understood that he wouldn't be interested in a weak woman who held him back. She needed to become a better kunoichi if she wanted to impress him.

For that reason, she was willing to undertake whatever hellish training their teacher would set down for them.

That resolve would soon be put to a test beyond her wildest imagination.

-xXx-

Naruto changed into Nako and walked back to her apartment, finding it empty. Sliding out of her clothes, she went into the shower and let the hot water fall on her tired body.

She had a team now. Admittedly, not an easy bunch under any aspect, but they were her teammates. For better or for worse she had to stick with them.

The first order of business was making them accept her as she was. It wasn't going to be easy, especially since she was oh so very different, not only from them but from everyone in general. Well, as far as Sasuke went, Naruto figured that all he had to do was keep up with him. Sakura was a much tougher cookie, especially if she saw Nako as a rival for Sasuke's affection.

In any event, it was going to be an uphill battle. Oh, well, if becoming Hokage was meant to be simple, everyone would be Hokage by now.

Having finished with her shower, she stepped out and dried her body, then she stepped into the living room without bothering to cover herself.

Her stomach gave a loud groan, so she went for the kitchen cupboard. Three minutes later, still naked, she was happily sitting at the table, wolfing down her first cup of ramen.

It was at this point that Shirota decided to return with two bags filled with groceries.

"Oh, hi!" Nako greeted in between mouthful.

"Uh, hello yourself," Shirota greeted in return, somewhat taken aback with Nako's laid back attitude while being in the nude.

A ruined man just the day before, he never expect to return to his temporary residence and find his gorgeous host to greet him in her _birthday suit_. In fact, it was so surreal that it even failed to immediately cause the expected reactions in his lower regions.

"I, uh, I borrowed a bit of your money. I hope you don't mind. I'm going to give it all back as soon as I find a job," he promised.

"Sure, sure," she waved him off. "Like I said, make yourself at home. By the way, I'm going to turn in soon; my day tomorrow is going to start early."

"I'm using the guest room, then."

"Uh? Well, that's fine if you prefer to sleep alone. Personally, I don't mind the company, but if you are going to sleep with me I'm telling you right now that I'm going to stab you if you snore."

"The guest room it is," Shirota confirmed with a sweat drop.

Nako laughed heartily. Standing up from the table she stretched her arms with a yawn. "Well, I'm off to bed. G'night."

"Good night," Shirota gulped, watching her naked form leave. He still couldn't wrap his mind around the way his life had turned out lately. Not that he was about to complain, mind you, but now there was this bothersome hard-on to deal with.

-xXx-

The next day, Team Seven gathered at the training grounds. Kakashi was nowhere to be seen, as expected, but since they didn't know whether he was late or he was just hiding, the Genin opted to train on their own instead of lazing about. Naruto and Sasuke engaged in a light spar, while Sakura, mindful of her teacher's words the previous day, jogged around the training ground to build up her stamina.

Kakashi, carefully hidden, watched their interactions with a measure of satisfaction. Individually speaking, they were going to be a handful to train, but at least they had the will and the drive to improve. Normally that's not something you find in Genin, who are always convinced to be the big-shots until humbleness was painfully driven into their thick skulls.

Sure, both Sasuke and Naruto had their fair amount of ego, but they were at least sufficiently mature to put it aside and work together. Of course, it remained to be seen if this behavior lasted under pressure, but Kakashi was glad that he didn't have to be a glorified babysitter too.

Sakura on the other hand was the opposite. It was clear that she had insecurities, both as a woman and as a ninja. Kakashi feared he had to work around both, but he wasn't sure he knew how to deal with the former. His own interactions with the female half of the world were... not the best there were. Not since Rin's death in any case. Maybe he could enlist Kurenai's help for that? With a team of her own, she probably didn't have much time to spare, but the only alternative was Anko. Kakashi wasn't sure Sakura would survive that woman and, if she actually did, if he would survive the Sakura that came out of it.

Not liking either outcomes, he decided to put the thought out of his mind for the moment and finally join his cute little Genin in training.

-xXx-

"Why won't you teach me a cool jutsu?" Naruto protested loudly after his umpteenth fall from a tree.

"There would be no point to it," Kakashi replied boredly, swatting away Sasuke's attacks while reading Icha-Icha. "Until you have mastered water walking enough to do it in your sleep there is no point in teaching you anything else. Sakura, give me another hundred push-ups."

Sakura's pitiful moan came from the side, where she was laying face down in the dirt from sheer exhaustion.

"But-" Naruto continued his protest only to have Kakashi cut him off.

"Before building a tower to reach the Heavens, you need to make a suitably strong foundation first. If I were to train you on more complex stuff before addressing your weaknesses first, I'd be only stunting your growth. Do you plan to become Hokage, or do you want to be just another run-off-the-mill shinobi?"

Naruto grumbled something unintelligible and returned to his tree-walking exercise.

"Cheer up," Kakashi told him, "in the afternoon we're going to practice with your Taijutsu."

Suitably mollified, Naruto went about his exercise in a better mood than before. The matter settled, the Jonin returned his focus on Sasuke.

Drenched in sweat, the last loyal Uchiha was throwing everything he had in his spar against Kakashi. He had been doing so for the past four hours with small breaks every thirty minutes.

"Ok, break," he declared. Sasuke stepped back, falling to his knees short of breath.

"So," he panted after a minute of rest, "why won't you teach me any jutsu either?"

"Because in your case is even more pointless. With your Sharingan you can learn a jutsu with a single glance and although I insist that you do master all worthwhile techniques through practice, our time is better invested in polishing your basics to the absolute limit. After all, even with one thousand jutsu at my disposal, most of my kills are still made with a simple kunai. You are a kunai yourself too, Sasuke, and I intend to sharpen your edge to the point where your enemies will get cut just by proximity. Knowing this, do you have any objections?"

In response, Sasuke stood back up and resumed his guard.

"That's what I thought."

The training resumed and continued without interruption or complaint until noon.

-xXx-

"I can't feel my body anymore," Sakura whined, slumping bonelessly on the seat of their restaurant booth.

"I wish I couldn't feel my body either," a severely bruised Sasuke complained by her side.

"I'm bored," Naruto said instead.

"Fuck! You!" Sakura and Sasuke said in unison.

"Hey, I'd rather be doing either of your training. Chakra control exercises are boring as hell!"

"Every training is supposed to be challenging in its own way," Kakashi said taking a seat with them. "Naruto, your lack of focus and your short attention span reflect on your poor chakra control. True, you have more latent chakra than anybody else so I understand that it's difficult for you to stand still in one place for long. However, that is also a weakness you must overcome."

"I get it, I get it," the blonde sighed. "I just wish it was different, you know?"

"Deal with it. I've got plenty of even more boring stuff lined up for you. Now, let's eat."

-xXx-

Two hours later, Team Seven was back at the training grounds, with Sakura and Sasuke recuperating from the morning session by doing chakra control exercise while Naruto sparring with Kakashi instead.

That is, if you could call sparring a completely one-sided beating.

"Not good enough," Kakashi said, slapping away Naruto's attacks and retaliating with a backhand to his face. "Your attacks are too wide and your defense is a joke."

"Agh!" Naruto groaned, roaring his fist for yet another attack, but his nose met Kakashi's jab before he could actually strike. Still, he shrugged it off and went on the offensive.

"I'll give you credit for perseverance," Kakashi told him, right before he swiped Naruto's feet sending him flat on his back, "but it still doesn't cut it."

"Oww!"

"Naruto," Kakashi said crouching by his side, "your Taijutsu is abysmal. It's like you don't know your own body... Wait, is this actually your real appearance?"

"How am I supposed to know?"

"Uh? What do you mean?"

"My transformations are all permanent," he explained. "It's not like I can just _revert_. I can only change again into a new form."

"... Crap," Kakashi muttered. "Naruto, undress."

"Meh?"

"You heard. Strip."

"Whoa, Sensei. I really don't mind being naked, but don't you think it'd be troublesome if someone were to see me like that?"

Killing intent filled the air like an ominous cloud.

"I'm stripping, I'm stripping!" Naruto said hastily. A minute later he was standing with only his very short boxers to cover him. Kakashi immediately noticed something out of order.

"Naruto... where are your genitals?"

"Eh? I didn't make them."

"You didn't... _what_?" Flabbergasted was a good way to describe Kakashi as of that moment.

"What's the point of having a dick if I don't have to use it?" Naruto asked. "It's just a weak spot."

"I... . Disturbing as it is, I actually have to agree with that. In any case, Naruto, what is the limit of your transformation?"

"Hm? Oh, it's very simple. I only have to occupy the same volume of space. Oh, and of course I can't remove any vital organ either."

"You can change your bones and muscle density at will?" Kakashi asked, understanding the implications.

"Of course. A girl's body is softer than a boy's so I have to change as much."

Kakashi grumbled. To the side, Sasuke and Sakura shared a glance over the oddity of their teammate, but they exchanged no word about it.

"Naruto, it's not surprising that your Taijutsu is so pathetic. You actually don't know your own body because you make it different every time. You have nearly no muscle memory."

"Eeeeh?!"

"Of all the dumb things... Okay, listen. I need you to find the form you're most comfortable with and memorize it to the smallest detail, am I clear? That will be your permanent form for all training and missions."

"Do I have to make a penis?"

"Just make the shape that works best for you," the Jonin sighed.

Naruto give it a thought for a long minute then he made a hand-seal.

**"Kage Henge!" **

A burst of smoke later, Naruto appeared slightly different from before. Well, his height was more or less the same but there were noticeable differences. The muscles were more outlined and his overall physique was leaner and not overly masculine.. Still no discernible genitals either.

Kakashi had to admit it: Naruto had truly embraced genderlessness to its fullest.

"Hold still," he ordered, running his hand over Naruto's body in an examining manner. "Hmm, everything necessary seem to be in the correct state. Are you sure this is your best?"

Naruto gave a tentative roll of his shoulders; crouching and stretching for a while in all directions effortlessly.

"Fits like a glove," he finally declared.

"Good, then this is your combat body. For the next two days I want you to familiarize yourself with this form. I need you to identify with this shape when you are on duty. Now, we're going to go over the Academy Taijutsu style from scratch while you are in that form. Show me the basic kata."

And so the afternoon slipped into the evening, with each Genin undergoing their own specific training.

-xXx-

Nako returned home feeling very frustrated. Who knew that changing body continuously had such a huge drawback on her Taijutsu? Now she had to make almost everything from the beginning.

Well, at least it was early enough to get some work done that night. Since they weren't taking any mission yet all of her incomes still came from the Velvet Room.

The bright side was that she wasn't tired in the least, so she wouldn't have any problem taking a couple of customers for the evening.

Finding no trace of Shirota, she cleaned up and dressed in her best clothes. After a quick meal she was out of her apartment again and into the evening of Konoha.

Nights like these reminded her vividly of her first meeting with _him._

-xXx-

**Naruto: Age Thirteen**

it was a warm summer evening and Naruto, in his female form, was wandering the streets of Konoha by herself with an ice cream cone in her hands.

It was not something she had bought with her money. Has a matter of fact it had been a long time since she had to use her own meager stipend to buy anything as a girl.

In this particular instance, her ice cream had been offered by a kind old man in exchange of her sitting on his lap for a while. Such instances had become a common occurrence for the resident of that district of Konoha.

Over the previous year, Nako had grown accustomed with being touched. Her peers sought her behind their parent's back because she was known to let them kiss and even fondle her body in exchange of small favors and gifts. As result Nako had become quite good at kissing and skin contact went from something inconsequential to something pleasurable.

Eventually, the voice had spread to a number of older citizens, who had already eyed the pretty little thing running around always by herself. Soon she was being called over by the older men, who offered her sweets and pretty clothes in exchange of simple things like sitting on their laps or kisses on the cheeks.

Nobody had dared cross the line yet, though. In a village of ninja, even one run by a kind-hearted Kage like Hiruzen, few people were foolish enough to try and break the law. Nako had yet to reach thirteen, the age of consent under Konoha's law, and therefore ill-intended hands refrained from going pass certain points.

However, that threshold was now behind her along with the protection it granted. Already a number of wolves were ready to make their moves.

Savoring the sweet deliciousness with gusto, the blonde wasn't really paying attention to where she was going. Inevitably she ended up bumping into someone. With the other person being much bigger, it was Nako who ended up with her butt on the ground.

"Ouch," she yelped. At her side, her ice cream splattered on the gravel. "Oh, nooh."

"Are you alright?" the person whom she had bumped into asked. Nako looked up, ready to make her displeasure known, only to find that person's eyes staring down at her. She immediately froze like a cornered rabbit.

The gray-haired, middle-aged man wasn't staring at her with unkind eyes. However his gaze seemed to pierce through her and stare right into her soul. Young and naive as she was, she couldn't quite understand why she had such a reaction.

She wasn't frightened. After all, she had been at the receiving end of hateful glares for most of her life and this wasn't one of those.

Unbeknownst to her, this was a man used to see his orders executed on the spot. Someone whose sheer authority had become a tangible thing.

A person with a strong personality and an equally strong willpower would have just shrugged it off. Nako had lost of the first, but just so much of the latter. So she didn't move, because that commanding presence hadn't told her that she could.

"Are you alright?" the man repeated, breaking the spell he had cast on her.

"Ah! Y-yes. Sorry I bumped into you, Oji-san."

"And I'm sorry about your ice-cream. How about I buy you another and we call it even?" he asked, holding out a hand to help Nako stand, which she readily took.

His touch around her fingers was gentle and warm. It made Nako feel safe and caused her heart to beat a little faster.

This person was the leader of that pack of wolves and their encounter hadn't been casual in the least.

"Come, I'll show you the best ice cream you'll ever taste."

Nako happily followed after the nice Oji-san, unknowingly taking her true first step toward her descent in a realm of depravity and debauchery.

* * *

**Last edit: 01/28/15**


	6. Rising Waves (I)

**Chapter 6  
Rising Waves (I)**

* * *

Ougi Miwako, thirty-five years old kunoichi of Konohagakure and mistress of the Velvet Room, sashayed through the corridors of her establishment. Being a true lover of the carnal arts, the cacophony of gasps and moans that came from every room was a sweet symphony to her ears.

Her curvaceous body heated and her enormous breast heaved increasingly with every step she took. Only years of experience and practice allowed her not to succumb to her own desire and join one of her subordinates. She had, after all, a much more important thing to do: supervise the growth of her precious disciple.

Following the corridor all the way to the last room, Miwako pulled open the sliding door just enough to peer inside, unseen.

She licked her lips at the sight.

Naruto, or rather Nako, was straddling her customer. Her kimono was pooled around her waist, concealing the point where their bodies met. There was little to imagine about what was happening, though.

The blonde girl was bouncing up and down her customer's cock with abandon, her own bountiful breast whipping up and down following the motion. Underneath her, the customer tried to match her tempo with thrust of his own, but he was falling short and not because he lacked stamina or skill. He was merely being overwhelmed by the pleasure that came from the vicious grip of Nako's wet folds.

That was the one thing Miwako knew she had in common with Naruto: when it came down to their personal preferences, what they liked was a real hard _fuck_. None of that sweet, love-making non-sense that some people seemed to like. Just plain, repeated and vicious thrusting. Even if it hurt. _Especially if it hurt._

That was about the only thing they had in common in regard to sex.

Miwako loved fucking. There weren't two ways about it. Even if she had come to learn and appreciate all manners of carnal pleasure, nothing could beat the feeling of a cock or three piercing and pounding her flesh.

People called her a hedonist. Miwako thought of herself more as a _slut to the core_. She had been like that since a very young age. Even before joining the Academy she was gladly blowing older kids behind the building, one after another for the fun of it. She couldn't even recall how old she was when she lost her virginity and to whom. It wasn't like she didn't recall the event or who was involved. There were just too many to know who accomplished the deed. Surely she had taken more dicks in the first week after popping her cherry than what most women did in their whole lives.

When she joined the Academy she immediately became local fuck-toy; always willing and always eager, before, during and after classes. Girls hated her for obvious reasons but boys loved her instead. At least as much as anyone can love someone who is seen as a cheap whore.

Of course, such a disposition had been noticed from day one by the instructors and upon graduation, instead of being assigned to a team like everybody else, she was taken aside by the previous mistress of the Velvet Room and trained suitably. Since then she had learned much, became more refined, sensual and skilled, but at her core she was still the same cock-starved slut she had been born.

Naruto wasn't like that. Oh, by all means he loved sex just as much as she did, but whereas Miwako relished the physicality and the decadence of the act, Naruto cherished the emotional aspect of it.

He held nothing back. Even if it was just for the duration of their intercourse, Naruto loved his partners with all of his heart and sought the satisfaction that came from giving pleasure rather than from taking it. He wasn't the best because he was the most skilled. He was the best because he gave exactly what each wanted.

If his partner needed a sweet, pure hearted lover, he'd become it.  
If his partner desired a submissive kitten, he'd become it.  
if his partner wished for a wanton slut, he'd become it.

All for the sake of the acknowledgment that came with fulfilling their heart's desire.

At those times, he was truly the most beautiful. Both as a male and a female he was an entrancing sight and Miwako sought him secretly, to watch him reach the apex of his pleasure.

She fondled her own breast, her fingers nearly disappearing in the resulting folds of flesh.

"Hmm," she moaned under her breath. "Oh, Naru-chan."

Sliding one hand between her legs, Miwako sought the increasingly wet spot, massaging it frantically with two fingers, while her other hand brought her breast to her mouth so that she could suckle on her stiff nipple. Had someone walked into the corridor right then, they would have seen the Mistress of the establishment masturbating furiously and shamelessly where everyone could see.

Realizing the gravity of the situation, she recomposed herself somewhat, covering her breasts hastily and promptly leaving the scene. She needed release. A strong, powerful orgasm or ten.

On her way back to her quarters, she saw a customer's bodyguard standing near the door to the room where his master was enjoying himself. She approached him sultrily and grabbed the collar of his shirt.

"Come with me," she said huskily with gleaming hunger in her eyes. "I'll make your every dream come true."

The following morning the bodyguard, whose name is unimportant to the story, found himself short of a job and with a cracked hip bone. Even then, nobody managed to wipe the smug grin from his face for a solid week.

-xXx-

Time passed and Team Seven's growth progressed slowly but surely. Of course strength and skills aren't acquired overnight.

After three weeks of training, Naruto was finally able to handle tree-walking for an indeterminate period of time, although he still left foot marks on the trees' bark. The immediate next step, in his mind, should have been water walking.

Kakashi didn't agree.

"Bwah!" the Jinchūriki exclaimed, slipping for the tree he was currently climbing. An unfurled scroll fell on his head and bounced away.

"Again," Kakashi's said boredly, flipping another page of his book.

Naruto groaned but stood back up again, picked up the scroll and walked up the tree once more, where he started reading while hanging upside down from a branch.

It took him all of two minutes before he fell again.

"Bwah! Goddamit!"

"Language, Naruto," Kakashi chided half-heartedly.

"Fuck you! What's the point of this stupid exercise?"

The Jonin sighed.

"How many times to I have to explain it before you get it, Naruto?"

"Apparently one more time," Sakura snarked from far to Kakashi's left, where she was making consecutive push-ups while pushing chakra to her hands and feet so to stay above the lake's water. Her attempt at humor was enough to upset the delicate balance and she ended up losing control, with obvious result. "Blargh!"

Kakashi largely ignored his drowning student to continue his explanation, while reading his book.

"Naruto, there are two types of chakra as far as humans are concerned."

"Mind and body, right?"

"Yin and Yang, yes," Kakashi agreed. "Now, the body, being the majority, provides the bulk of our chakra but control is inevitably a thing of the mind. In order to efficiently use our energy there must be a certain amount, like, for instance, one unit of mind chakra for every ten units of body chakra. The moment the ration one's body chakra increases disproportionally, control wavers. Sakura-chan over there is a rare case of 1 to 1 ratio of body and mind. Her control can't possibly get any better, but increasing her reserves while keeping that ratio is a nightmare. And then there is you with your own peculiar circumstance."

"Yeah. Damn fur-ball."

"In any event," Kakashi pressed on, "sharpening the mind is the only way to sharpen control. Smarter Shinobi always have better control, but the opposite also work."

"Uh?"

"What I mean to say is that while training your mind sharpen your control, training your control also sharpen your mind. Your case is so desperate that we must tackle the problem from both sides at the same time."

"So do I have to study while I exercise my control?"

"Yes, and you have to exercise your control while you study."

"It sounds too convenient," Naruto objected skeptically. "Does it really work?"

"I do it all the time," Kakashi nodded.

"Like when?" he asked. Kakashi merely flipped another page of his book. "Ah! Wait, reading Icha-Icha doesn't count as studying!"

"Doesn't it? Do you think it takes no effort to focus on something mentally taxiing like sparring or walking on vertical surface while reading something that by all means and purpose should direct your thought on something very physical and still not miss a word?"

"You're just a pervert," Sakura declared, having managed to return to shore.

"And that's another hundred push-ups for you."

"YOU MONSTER!" the pinkette raged.

"So energetic," Kakashi smiled. "Two hundred push-ups."

Sakura bit her tongue real hard to avoid getting even more push-ups.

"So, that how it is, Naruto. Pick up your scroll and go back to your tree."

"Just how long am I supposed to do this training?"

"At least until you can answer correctly to all questions pertaining the history curricula from the first year at the academy. Study hard."

"Since you are in a mood for explanations," Sasuke said, "would you mind explaining me the meaning for my training instead?"

Sasuke was upside down, balancing himself with only two fingers from his left hand and with the other arm behind his back. He had been doing that for two hours, occasionally swapping hand when his fingers became too tired.

"Refinement. You have no flaw to speak of as far as the shinobi arts are involved, but there's always room for improvement. Keeping that balance for extended periods of time teaches you to use those muscle that you normally don't employ. They don't seem like much, but in order to break the plateau that separate anyone from martial arts mastery you need to learn where they are, and how they feel. Also, it forces you to be patient, something you really do need to learn."

Sasuke grumbled but continued his own training.

"Cheer up. Next week we're going to do a bunch of D-rank missions and if I'm satisfied with what I see I might just apply for a C-Rank.

**"Seriously?"** the trio asked as one, although with different tones of voice. The effect of that disruption had the expected effect on both Naruto and Sakura, but Kakashi didn't pay them any mind.

"Yeah. I think you three have what it takes to handle something of that caliber."

"All right," Naruto jumped, "let's save a princess or something."

"That would most definitely not be a C-Rank," Kakashi deadpanned, "but I'll see what I can do."

-xXx-

**Three weeks later**

"Are these brats really going to be my bodyguards?" the drunkard bridge-builder Tazuna asked, looking at the three equally unimpressed Genin of Team Seven. "They don't look like much."

"Hey, Sensei," Naruto whispered. "We haven't accepted the mission yet. Can I still kill him?"

_"I heard that!"_

"Naruto..." Kakashi said warningly.

"Can I at least stab him a little bit?"

"No killing and no stabbing the client either, Naruto."

"Mou!"

Sakura face-palmed and Sasuke pinched the bridge of his nose as if to quell a headache.

"Don't worry, Tazuna-san," Kakashi reassured. "Our team is trained and prepared to escort you back to your country. You need not to worry."

"Well, all right then," Tazuna agreed, unconvinced but resigned. "I'm leaving tomorrow for Wave. You better not make me wait."

-xXx-

**The next morning**

Team Seven gathered at the gate early in the morning. For the Genin, this was the first time leaving the safe boundaries of the Village's walls. There was a palpable child-like excitement for at least two-thirds of them. Sasuke was only excited at the prospect of finally putting his training into practice.

But excited or not, they were still ninja and preparation was a sacred thing. The three of them were double-checking their equipment. Sleeping bags, tents, energy bars, soldier pills, first aid kits, kunai holsters and other tools.

Everything was in perfect order. The only thing that was out of place, so to speak, was Naruto.

The blonde ninja attire wasn't his usual orange jumpsuit, nor the black gi he used during training session. It was entirely black, except for the white bandages wrapped around his for forearms, shins and waist. The neck of the outfit hung loosely at his shoulders and followed along the collarbone until it dove to a sharp V in the middle of his chest. It would have been quite a daring look, if not for the mesh shirt he wore underneath.

"What's with that outfit?" Sasuke asked with a nod of his head. "It's too loose at the chest. You risk being grabbed.

"When I do the Kage Henge, only my body change. The clothes stays the same," Naruto explained, matter-of-factly.

"So?"

"Think about how my _other self_ usually looks. Do you think it would fit if it was tighter around the chest?" Naruto asked with a lifted eyebrow.

Realizing what his teammate was getting at, Sasuke allowed himself to blink once in disconcert. Then, deciding to pretend that conversation never happened, he wordlessly turned around to check his gear one more time.

Naruto shrugged and did the same. One could never be too careful, after all.

Tazuna picked that moment to arrive.

"All right," Kakashi called out. "Sakura, you keep close to Tazuna-san. If anything happens, layer a Genjutsu to hide yourself with the client. Sasuke, you take point. Naruto, the rear-guard is yours. The escort of a full team should be enough to dissuade any bandit to attempt a thing, but there is no shortage of fools in this world. Be on your guard at all times. Am I clear?"

"Yes, sir," the three Genin replied as one in an unusual show of formality.

"Then we're moving out."

-xXx-

They had been traveling quietly for about two days.

Sakura chatted amiably with Tazuna, who turned out to be much more pleasant than what his first impression would have suggest. Maybe it was because he was half-way down toward sobriety, or maybe it was Sakura's charming personality._._

In any event, the mission so far was a glorified school-trip.

That is, until Naruto's head suddenly jerked up.

"Taichō," he called out to Kakashi. The Jonin shifted his attention from his book to his Genin. The blonde approached him and whispered something in his ear. Kakashi's eye turned from bored to sharp and attentive.

Boredom wasn't going to be an issue much longer, it appeared.

-xXx-

Gozu and Meizu, also known as the Demon Brothers, were not a happy duo. In fact they were severely pissed off at their current predicament. Deep inside Fire Country, way too close to Konoha for anyone's comfort, they had the ungrateful task to lay in wait for days only to kill a mere bridge-builder. Two former Chūnin from Kirigakure, employed to kill a nobody that a bunch of drunk bandits could have handled with their arms tied behind their back.

In their words: _'What a fucking insult.'_

It was sufficient proof that having followed their boss in his endeavor had been a stupid idea. Yet, even for shinobi there was no use crying over split milk, therefore the scornful duo could only wait and wait some more, until their prey finally showed up and with some illustrious company, no less.

There was no mistaking the figure of the infamous Copycat Kakashi among the group. If they took his head along with that of the bridge builder their reputation would skyrocket and they could possibly find asylum in another Hidden Village. Forget living on the run from Hunter Nins. This was their chance for a real comeback.

As soon as the group had walked past the puddle on the road they moved. Bursting out of the water they went for the most dangerous target, Kakashi himself. Their chain wrapped around him and without stopping their motion it tore him to small bloody pieces.

The desperate cry of his students were a nice background music to their victory. Still, a job's not done until there are enemies standing. They went for the closest one yet, the blonde haired one.

Unlike the Jonin, the weak Genin didn't require nearly the same amount of caution. Merely a speck of dust on their path as he was, their chain cut through his waist a fraction of second after they had dashed past him to the sides.

The black-haired one came at them, kunai bared. That only served to accelerate his death. Meizu's claw found his soft face after a feint. They didn't watch him die and immediately went for the kunoichi defending their actual target.

On top of their excitement, her utterly terrified face was enough to give them an epic hard-on. Gozu tore through her chest while Meizu slit the paralyzed bridge builder's throat.

Then, both of their victims disappeared in a burst of smoke, two logs bouncing on the ground at their feet.

They swiftly turned around. Were there should have been three dead bodies, an equal number of wooden logs fell instead.

Kawarimi? No, there had been a resistance when they struck. Some type of Bushin that dispelled on contact, each carrying a log with them. But why? Logs served to only to get out of harm's way. What was the point of having expendable clones carrying them?

The five pieces of wood hadn't yet settled on the ground that the answer to that question became self-apparent.

The purpose of a Kawarimi isn't necessarily to _dodge, _but simply to perform high speed movements. Whether that movement serves to get away or get closer depended entirely on the user's intention.

Five figures swapped places with the logs. Four ninjas and their client now surrounded them, Kakashi of the Sharingan looming over them.

_'__Fuck.'_

A kunai from the Jonin immediately pinned their chain to the ground but without missing a beat, the brothers promptly discarded it.

Naïve. They had been way too naïve. Their ambush had been seen through in advance and the trap had been sprung on them instead. Engaging in combat was a ridiculous idea at this point.

Their only intelligent option was to retreat. Still, the enemy had made a grievous mistaken in taking the bridge builder back. If they had to escape, they could very well do it in the direction of their primary target.

They moved without exchanging a word. Kakashi didn't pursue, possibly wanting to let his students get some experience out of the situation. The asshole was looking down on them just because he saw through their trap. The death of their students and the failure of their mission would be on him.

The two male Genin were already on an intercept course, one for each of the Demon Brothers. Gozu and Meizu had been naïve, but these Genin were being outright stupid. A single Chūnin is more than a match to some Genin fresh out of the academy like these. Meizu alone engaged them both, while Gozu darted past them on his way to Tazuna.

A kunai flew to the pink-haired kunoichi, which she dodged by rolling out of the way, and their quarry was free for the taking. Much to their fortune, Kakashi still hadn't moved yet.

Realization dawned upon Meizu at the last possible moment.

Five logs. Five people. Five Kawarimi.

_'__Civilians don't do Kawarimi.'_

"Gozu!" he shouted. "Don't!"

Too late.

_Tazuna's_ fist collided in a vicious uppercut against Gozu's chin, hard enough to shatter teeth and, more importantly, to give him a neck-breaking whiplash. The strength of the punch was such that it dispelled the Henge cast around the real Kakashi, who looked down boredly at the dead Gozu.

Enraged as he was, Meizu wasn't in any condition to mourn his fallen brother. The two Genin were surprisingly hard to deal with. The dark haired one in particular had skills in Taijutsu to match a number of Chūnin and with the blonde's support Meizu was pouring everything he had to just survive.

He was spared from making further pointless efforts by three well placed kunai in the back, courtesy of the fake Kakashi. That gave the two Genin enough of an opening to finish the job with one kunai to the heart and one to the throat.

Meizu died with an anticlimactic gurgle, unable even to curse his killers with the last of his breath. A pathetic existence to the very end.

-xXx-

"Seven out of ten," Kakashi declared as the last of their would-be-ambushers fell lifelessly on the ground.

"What's with that shitty score?" Sasuke asked without removing his eyes for his victim out of caution. Naruto's gaze was similarly glued to the corpse, although probably from the shock of having taken the first human life of his career. The blonde's hand were tremble slightly.

Sasuke, oh his part, was already well bloodied and also quite broken. One more dead person in his life wasn't even worthy of notice, even if he was one of his own making.

"You let one get away and to the client," Kakashi explained. "And no, it doesn't count that it was me in disguise. Also, you failed to capture one alive for interrogation."

"Bah," Sasuke scoffed. "We don't need to interrogate them. I'm sure our dear client himself can explain us in detail why there were Missing-Nins after his hide. Isn't that right, Tazuna-san?"

The Genjutsu was dispelled and the real Tazuna appeared at the real Sakura's side a few meters behind them, in the direction they were coming from. Before bursting in clouds of smoke, the fake Kakashi and the fake Sakura dispelled the Henge, revealing two of Naruto's Kage Bushin. On cue , several more clones appeared from woods around the road all around them.

It had been one of them who had spotted the suspicious puddle where the Demon Brothers were hidden and promptly dispelled itself to give its knowledge to the original. The twelve Bushin, deployed in a circle around the group at a distance of several hundred meters from the centre, were Naruto's own initiative: a self-aware and autonomous alarm perimeter. By no mean infallible, but still a pretty damn cleaver idea for a Genin that even the experienced Jonin was impressed with.

"Well, I can't argue with that," Kakashi conceded Sasuke's point. "Well, what do you have to say for yourself, Tazuna-san?"

The defeated-looking bridge builder could no longer hide the truth behind this mission.

-xXx-

**Thirty minutes later**

Tazuna poured his heart and soul retelling the story of the misfortune that befell his country. Once a prosperous land, Wave had withered under the iron grip of the magnate Gatou, who had seized monopoly of the entire country's naval transportation and subsequently drained its economy, driving the population to starvation, misery and despair.

"I sympathize with your plight, Tazuna-san," Kakashi said compassionately, "but you lied about the mission parameters. Fees notwithstanding, you have put my team in great danger by withholding critical information. I'm afraid this voids our contract."

Tazuna's shoulders slumped in defeat.

"Although," Kakashi continued. "it would be quite a waste going back after coming this far. I will leave the final decision with my team. Well, what do you guys think we should do? Proceed against unknown opposition or return home?"

The three Genin exchanged a meaningful glance and an equally meaningful nod.

"Let's keep going," Sakura spoke for the group.

Kakashi was inwardly pleased, although he had to refrain from showing it outwardly.

They saw through it, no doubt. His cute little Genin saw through the fact that _Kakashi himself knew everything all along_.

There was just no way that Konoha, with its information network, didn't know about the state of the neighboring country, or the role that Tazuna played in the scheme of things.

If Team Seven had been deployed for that mission it mean that Konoha endorsed Tazuna's attempt and that Team Seven had been reputed capable of accomplishing the mission.

Forget C-Rank. The mission was easily B or even A-ranked. Ambitious as they were, there was just no way that Team Seven would pass an opportunity like that.

As for why a team of one Jonin and three green Genin were tasked with such an endeavor, the answer was probably found within the maelstrom of politics that was inherently part of the working of every Hidden Village. The ultimate scope was beyond them, but their role in this play was all too clear now.

Team Seven would keep on advancing, no matter the adversities laying ahead.

* * *

**Last edit. 02/09/2015**


	7. Rising Waves (II)

**Chapter 7  
Rising Waves (II)**

* * *

Momochi Zabuza , Swordsman of the Mist, Kirigakure's Nukenin and proud owner of Kubikiribōchō was not a happy man. Not that he ever was a particularly cheerful person, mind you. Something about slaughtering his own classmates the first day at the academy sort of disavowed that notion. Having failed a coup d'état and being forced to flee his country didn't add to his sunny disposition either.

In short, he wasn't the sort of person you'd hang around with if you could help it.

Even then, having received no word from the Demon Brothers put him in an even fouler mood that usual. Not that he cared much for them, of course, but a traitor on the run can't afford to lose assets easily, even if they were two shitty Chūnin that can't even kill a civilian.

Really, Kirigakure parted with the title of Demon far too easily these days. It made him feel ashamed to be called the same. Some people would inevitably think that he was just as good as the Demon Brothers, which is to say not good at all.

He should have killed them right after escaping Kiri and before they could add to his shame. If by some reason they weren't dead yet, he would rectify that mistake as soon as the opportunity arose. Now that was something to look forward to.

But business always came first. Now, the Demon Brothers, shitty as they were, were still shinobi of some skill. A drunken bridge builder could not have survived them by himself. Hence Tazuna was not by himself and whomever it was that escorted him was at least better than Gozu and Meizu put together.

Maybe it was somebody worth killing personally. That alone could very well make it worthwhile having to listen to Gatou's daily complaints without gutting him.

"Come on, Haku," he told to the silent figure in the corner, "let's go meet Kubikiribōchō's next victims."

"Hai, Zabuza-sama," the masked figure replied.

Like shadows, the two figures disappeared in the mist that shrouded Wave.

-xXx-

After sealing the heads of the fallen Demon Brothers into a scroll, Team Seven continues the journey to Tazuna's home. Come dawn of the third day since they left Konoha, they stood in front of the patch of sea that separated the Land of Wave from the Land of Fire which they started traversing with the help of a smuggler and his tiny boat.

While on water, Kakashi observed his Genin with a keen eye. They were all on their guards and more than a little tense. Naruto was still shaken from having taken a life, but he was coping well after Kakashi took him to the side and spoke to him at length. Of course, it wasn't like Naruto wasn't expecting it to happen sooner later. The academy did its best to ease the students in the idea of killing, though that worked as well as it could be expected.

Still, Kakashi was glad that Naruto was shaken by the experience. It was proof that he was a human and not the Kyuubi incarnated like the villagers liked to believe. Conversely, Sasuke was the picture of calmness and that was testament of how broken he was. Sakura wasn't bloodied yet, but watching Meizu's and Gozu's beheading turned her a little green, even if they were already dead by that point. He could only hope she wouldn't freeze in combat.

Speaking of combat, they going to be attacked again soon. Kakashi's bingo book had the Demon Brothers listed as the infamous Momochi Zabuza's subordinates. Although there was a chance that they had long since broken ties with the Demon of the Mist, Kakashi wouldn't have bet a single Ryō on the possibility. Two ninja of that caliber wouldn't have survived that long on their own. No doubt, with each step toward Tazuna's house the more likely it was that they would run in the Swordsman of the Mist. Hopefully he wouldn't find them until they were ashore, otherwise they would be at great disadvantage. Kakashi could handle fighting on top of the water no problem and he didn't have to worry about Sasuke either, but Sakura, Naruto and of course Tazuna were little more than sitting ducks. Naruto could probably handle walking on water if he didn't have to focus on anything else and Sakura too if she didn't have to keep it up for too long. In the event of an attack on water Tazuna's only hope of survival was being carried to shore by Sasuke, while Kakashi kept Zabuza occupied.

Of course that would work only if Zabuza showed up alone. In the event that he had semi-competent backup they were fucked, hands down.

The worst didn't come to pass, possibly because, out of caution, Tazuna's smuggler friend dropped them not on the shore closest to their destination but considerably father away, as Kakashi had expected without needing to ask. One does not live the life of a smuggler long if they don't know how far to go. Let it be known that not only ninjas were masters at passing unnoticed.

With a few words of farewell to their impromptu ferryman, the group set foot on solid ground unscathed.

With Tazuna in the middle, always shadowed by Sakura they set off to his place. Every moment now, he knew, they would run into an ambush. In that case it was better to make a plan. He motioned Sakura to get close and whispered in her ear. Her expression went from curious to fearful, but she gave him a nod all the same after Kakashi had done explaining.

"I'll handle it."

After that their march continued undisturbed for about half an hour, when Sakura heard a rustling in the bushes nearby. After a second of unbearable tension, a small white bunny hopped out of the foliage. Naruto let out a relieved breath, but Sakura's muscles coiled.

"**DOWN!"** she shouted tackling Tazuna to the ground about a tenth of a second before Kakashi could do so himself. The Jonin let himself fall backward, while Naruto and Sasuke both acknowledged Sakura's command unquestioningly even without knowing why, although that became apparent a fraction of second later.

A massive spinning blade sailed where they were standing a moment earlier and embedded itself in the trunk of a tree, parallel to the ground. A man with a bandaged face and a scratched Hitai-ate was crouched onto it.

"Hatake Kakashi, the Copy Ninja," the man said in a grave voice. "I wasn't expecting you."

"Momochi Zabuza, Demon of the Mist," Kakashi replied in a deadpan, standing back up. "I can't really say the same."

"This is what I get for letting two morons handle something even remotely important," he grumbled. "Still, even though you were expecting me you only took three Genin as a backup. I would kill you for that insult, if I wasn't going to kill you anyway."

"Maah, it's not like you'll get any chance to hurt them anyway. I'll send you to meet your subordinates in hell, here and now."

"Bold words Kakashi," Zabuza snarled. "For that, I'll kill your Genin first."

"I'd like to see you try," the Copycat replied, dead serious.

"If flapping your mouth is the only thing you're good at, I don't really think we have to worry about anything," Sasuke said flatly, casually swatting the dirt from his clothes as he got back up.

Zabuza on his part didn't reply with words. He just flipped in the air, grabbing the hilt of his massive sword, and dashed toward Sasuke. The Genin stood with both hands in his pockets and a spinning Sharingan in his left eye.

That was about when Zabuza realized that something was very wrong. Hard to say if was Sasuke's confident demeanor in the face of a superior opponent that tipped him off or rather the fizzing of an explosive tag about to go off on the flat of his blade, but Zabuza let go of his sword and leaped back pretty damn quick.

_**BOOM!**_

Despite his fast reaction, Zabuza was still partially caught into the explosion and was flung backward.

"You little shi-!"

Kakashi took advantage of his opponent's distraction to move closer from his blind spot. In spite of it, Zabuza managed to fend off Kakashi's strikes at his vital points, but still received minor cuts here and there.

"This is what you get for underestimating my Genin," Kakashi told him matter-of-factly.

"It only means I'm going to kill them slowly while you watch," Zabuza snarled.

-xXx-

"Nice trick slapping that explosive tag on sword when it flew over us," Naruto said as he watched the two Jonin clash.

"Hm," Sasuke replied noncommittally, his Sharingan firmly focused on the ongoing battle. If he had paid a little more attention to his surrounding he might have notice the ice slowly creeping up on them.

"SASUKE!"

Naruto moved and pushed his teammate to the side. From within an ice mirror that had formed almost at his feet, a flurry of senbon flew where Sasuke was standing a moment earlier.

"Another enemy?" he asked as he scrambled to his feet.

As if answering his question, a masked figure clad in a kimono rose from the ice mirror, apparently unperturbed to be surrounded by the three Genin.

"Until Zabuza-sama is done with his opponent," the masked ninja spoke with a muffled voice, "I will keep you occupied."

Then with an unspoken command, several ice mirrors formed all around them, caging the three Genin and their client.

"This is… _Hyoton_?" Sakura wondered aloud. "Naruto, Sasuke, this guy has a Kekkei Genkai. Watch out."

"Finally a worthwhile opponent," Sasuke said with glee, Sharingan spinning with renewed vigor. "You… you will make me stronger. Naruto, Sakura, you two keep Tazuna safe. This guy is mine."

Naruto made a hand-seal and five clones appeared around him.

"I'll watch your back too," Naruto declared. "I have the feeling this one is really tough."

"Don't get in my way, Idiot."

"I might not have much of a choice, Bastard. Unless you want me to kill your brother after you are dead and rotting."

If looks could kill, Naruto would have been dead twice over.

"Fine, then I'll become Hokage when you die like a moron."

"You mean _if_ I die."

"Pretty sure I don't."

The intense exchange of glares was interrupted when they had to duck under an onslaught of senbon.

"Stop ignoring me, you two," the masked ninja said with a drop of annoyance dripping into his otherwise calm voice.

"Can't this guy see we're having a conversation here?" Naruto asked, cracking his knuckles.

"Seems like he needs to be taught some manners," Sasuke agreed, rolling his shoulders.

"**Let's kick his ass,"** they agreed, stepping toward the obstacle that stood between them and their ambitions.

-xXx-

Kakashi danced around Zabuza's attacks, stealing worried glances at the dome of ice mirrors around his students.

"They are as good as dead," the Nukenin whispered with glee. "No one ever escaped that technique."

"There's a first time for everything, you know? Those three... there's nothing they can't handle if they put their minds together."

"My tool won't fail against three brats."

"Is your so called tool good enough to get at me? Because that's what they can do when they work together."

"I don't care about your bullshit, Kakashi. Come on, bring it out. Bring out the **Sharingan**!"

"Are you so eager to die, Demon of the Mist? Well, far from me to deny a dead man's wish."

Kakashi pulled up the Hitai-ate underneath which Obito's Sharingan spun.

"We'll see who's a dead man, Kakashi."

The two Jonin rushed at each other and the clashing of steel echoed through the air.

-xXx-

Haku moved from mirror to mirror, nearly impossible to follow. His senbon literally rained all over his dominion of ice and yet they weren't connecting. The black haired boy with the Sharingan, Sasuke, was keeping up with his movements, never losing sight of him. The blonde one, Naruto, wasn't as fast but Haku couldn't hit him either. Every time he thought he had nailed him with own of his senbon what he thought the original turned out to be yet another clone. Even if he wasn't aiming to kill, it still annoyed him that his offensive was totally ineffective.

With both sides unable to hit each other, this confrontation was going to become a war of attrition, but Haku couldn't afford it. His chakra reserves, while not meager weren't exceptional either, and with the mirror dome he was running through them fast. He needed to finish it quickly and go back to his Master's side. For all the confidence he had in Zabuza's skills, Kakashi of the Sharingan was not an opponent to face alone.

That's when he decided to see if he could break their formation by going after the pinkette and the bridge builder. A pacifist to the core, Haku hated hurting people who didn't want to fight, but if that meant helping Zabuza no sacrifice was too great.

Making it obvious that he had changed his target, Haku dove toward the defenseless duo.

"Sakura!" Naruto shouted as his clones jumped in Haku's way but they were mowed down like small fries. When the masked ninja finally had a clear shot, he sent a number of senbon with deadly precision at the pressure points in their neck. They wouldn't die, but they would look like they did. Haku would then capitalize the rage of the other two to break them too.

It was a good plan. Emotions were a tool to be used against those who felt them. That's why Zabuza believed that a true Shinobi was a tool and not a person.

Haku wasn't all that good at it, apparently, because he was very surprised when his senbon reached the pinkette's and the bridge builder's neck and continued straight through unhindered.

"What" Haku and Naruto both deadpanned. The image of Sakura and Tazuna wavered and disappeared exposing and dispelling the Genjutsu.

"Not bad, Sakura," Sasuke smirked. "Not bad at all."

Then, the sound of a thousand birds descended toward them.

_**"Raiton: Chidori!"**_ the voice of Kakashi declared from the mirror closest to Haku. The ice shattered and Kakashi came straight trough, Sharing bared, aiming his lightening-clad hand at Haku's chest.

The rankless ninja dove to one of his other mirrors and then to the next as Kakashi shattered them one after another in hot pursuit.

Why? How could he be there? Even if Kakashi was stronger than Zabuza there was no way his Master had been defeated so quickly. But then... who was Zabuza fighting against?

-xXx-

"Why? Why can't I hit you? I should be faster than you. Is this the power of the Sharingan, Kakashi?"

"Perhaps you are just a lousy ninja after all, Zabuza."

"You... I'll fucking kill you, Kakashi!"

_**CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! CRASH!**_

One after another, much to Zabuza's disbelief, Haku's ice mirrors shattered like they were made of cheap glass instead of chakra enhanced ice.

"Impossible! Those brats couldn't... _Uh?_"

A figure tore down the dome, mirror by mirror. A figure with silver hair and a fistful of lightning. Zabuza's eyes widened, as he recognized Kakashi as the culprit. His gaze returned to the Kakashi that was engaging him.

"A clone? But... Fuck, no. **KAI!"**

_Kakashi_ wavered and disappeared into thin air. Zabuza's eyes darted around, looking for the source. There, among the trees along the road stood the pink haired kunoichi, middle and index finger held up together in the simplest of seals. Bile rose to the Nukenin's mouth.

"A... a Genin's Genjutsu? _Youuuu..._"

The kunoichi yelped at Zabuza's killing intent and quickly hid back among the shadows of the forest.

The dome finally collapsed and Haku flew out, skidding to a halt at his enraged Master's side.

"Forgive me, Zabuza-sama. I was overwhelmed."

"No," the Demon of the Mist whispered, retrieving his sword. "We have both been fooled. To think that Kakashi would send his Genin to keep a Jonin occupied... I underestimated his shrewdness."

"You are mistaken, Zabuza," Kakashi affirmed, landing a few meters of distance with Naruto and Sasuke in two. "You didn't underestimate me. You underestimated my cute little Genin."

Sakura emerged from the trees, further down behind her teammates and teacher with an ashen-looking Tazuna in tow.

"I see. So you weren't just boasting when you said the three of them together could even get at you."

"Hmm? What you talking abou…. Sakura? What has your illusion been saying around?"

"Eh eh eh," the pink-haired kunoichi chuckled, sticking out her tongue. "It's not like it's a lie."

"This is what I get for praising them," Kakashi snorted in amusement.

"Tch," Zabuza scoffed. "I admit it was your victory today, Kakashi. I'll get you next time."

"There won't be a next time, Zabuza." Kakashi's hand reignited with lightning.

"It's not your call to make. See ya soon."

An ice mirror formed under the two ninja and they _'fell'_ through it. It then shattered before Kakashi could attempt to follow.

"There they go."

"Kakashi why did you let them escape?" Sasuke asked. "You could have killed them both."

"Yes," Kakashi admitted. "But there wasn't a single good reason to."

"They are the enemy."

"No they aren't," Naruto objected. "They are the enemy's, Gatou's, tools."

"Naruto is right, Sasuke. If we killed them at this point Gatou would simply hire someone else. Someone better in all likelihood and certainly someone we know nothing about. Our objective is to keep Tazuna safe until he's done building his bridge. I'd rather protect him from the enemy I know that one I don't. This is as close to having the upper hand as we can get."

Sasuke's eyes narrowed. He understood the validity of Kakashi's words, but still…

"You'll find, Sasuke, that sometime victory can only be achieved without killing," Kakashi pressed on as if sensing his student's doubts. "That of course depends entirely what we consider as being the winner. Think about it when you get the chance."

"Hn," Sasuke acknowledged, if only barely. "Let's go. We haven't got all day."

"Maah," Kakashi sighed. "What a troublesome bunch of Genin I've got on my hands."

-xXx-

The rest of the trip was relatively uneventful, although they did get to witness the poverty that befell Wave.

"I still don't understand how Zabuza could have fallen for Sakura's Genjutsu," Naruto said. "No offense meant Sakura, but he's a Jonin."

"None taken."

"Imagine that two groups each composed of a Jonin and three Genin were to fight," Kakashi explained. "How do you think the opposing sides would pair against each other? Jonin versus Jonin and Genin vs. Genin, isn't it? Sending a Genin against a Jonin under ordinary circumstances is tantamount to sending them to their death."

The disciples nodded.

"Zabuza thought so too, therefore he didn't question what he was seeing until the end. Sakura's Genjutsu was excellent, however when it comes down to it the most efficient use of deception is not fabricating a lie, but rather letting the enemy fool themselves that things are exactly as they should. When you get caught in your own delusions being Genin or Kage doesn't matter much."

"Still-" Naruto protested.

"Naruto, no one's unbeatable and having achieved a rank doesn't make anyone inherently superior to someone who hasn't. If you allow yourself to think otherwise, you'll end up like Zabuza or worse."

"In any case, Kakashi," Sasuke intervened. "A ninja of Zabuza's level shouldn't have been able to feel something was amiss?"

"Hmm. In the first place, Genjutsu can be divided in two macro-categories: Illusions and Hypnosis. The first group is made up of, well, illusions that are actually perceived by the normal five senses. Anyone who were to look would see them even if they weren't the intended target. Even if they are incorporeal those illusions are actually there. Jutsu like Henge and Bushin fall into this category. Those type of techniques allow the user to show only what they personally knows. The quality of the jutsu depends then on the user's control and attention to details."

"Hypnosis doesn't work like that, I assume."

"Nope," Kakashi shook his head. "They don't require the user to know anything about what they are trying to show. They capitalize on the victim's own memories and emotions. They are far more difficult to master, and much more vicious. However, because they are likely going to manifest things out of place for the circumstances they can be more likely to be identified and dispelled. A true master of Genjutsu isn't just someone who can use all the Jutsu perfectly, but rather a person who can seamlessly weave both types together and forge an inescapable nightmare."

"So, against a stronger opponent a simpler technique is more likely to work."

"Not really. Like I taught you the most basics skills honed to mastery are much better than extremely powerful jutsu used shoddily."

"Hn," Sasuke acknowledged begrudgingly. Until then he didn't really want to believe Kakashi's theory, but seeing Sakura, of all people, fool a Jonin with the application of Academy-level Genjutsu forced him to reconsider some of his belief.

At noon they finally reached Tazuna's home.

"Tsunami? I'm home. I've brought guests."

Silence met Tazuna's statement. Not a good sign. The ninjas tensed in preparation.

A noise on the second floor caught their attention. Rushing footsteps were heard and a moment later a woman with long black hair appeared, looking a flustered and with her clothes a bit disheveled. Her face lightened up seeing the old man.

"Father! You're back." She rushed into his arms, hugging him. "It took you so long. I thought something happened to you on the road."

"AH!" the bridge builder laughed. "A lot of things happened on my way back, actually. Luckily I had these super-ninjas as bodyguards so I don't have a scratch on me."

"Is that so? You have my gratitude. Please, make yourself at home while you're here."

"Don't mind if we do," Kakashi bowed slightly.

"Oh, you must all be hungry. I'll prepare something to eat right away."

Naruto narrowed his eyes at the woman when she passed him by on her way to the kitchen. Her smell… he would never mistake it for something else. As if to confirm his suspicions he heard a creak on the second floor.

"Is there anyone else in the house?" he asked casually.

"Yes, my son Inari should have returned a little while ago."

"I see," the Jinchūriki replied. Maybe he was reading too much into it. What a woman did in her spare time was her own business.

"He's a bit unsocial, so forgive him if he doesn't come down to greet you."

"It's not a problem."

Half a hour later the group had eaten lunch. With their bellies now full the ninja could discuss their strategy for the foreseeable future.

-xXx-

"UNACCEPTABLE!" the half-pint that was Gatou raged. "I pay you to kill one man, one meager bridge-builder, and you come back here with your tail tucked between your legs."

"Shut up," Zabuza growled. "The moment Konoha became involved in this business everything changed. Your bridge builder has hired one of the strongest ninja in the Land of Fire and his team as bodyguards. It's no longer a simple matter like casually dropping by and kill a man."

"And what do you plan to do about that, uh? Is the Demon of the Mist really so worthless?"

"Call me worthless one more time and I'll be using your body fat to grease my sword."

Gatou, wisely, swallowed whatever remark his brain could have concocted.

"We are at a disadvantage. With four of them and just the two of us a straight up fight is out of the question. We must employ a different tactic."

"Zabuza-sama," Haku stepped forward. "They don't know my face."

"Hm. There is that. Very well, I'll leave it in your hands. Look for a weakness to exploit."

"Hai!"

Haku shunshined away.

"Can he be trusted?" Gatou asked.

"Of course. He's my precious tool after all."

* * *

AN: Apologies for the lack of smut in the recent chapters. I promise there will be a scene in the next.

Also: Beta Wanted.


	8. Rising Waves (III)

**Chapter 8  
Rising Waves (III)**

* * *

Kino Mamoru, age twenty, was a cheap sword-for-hire, which in a world of Ninja of incredible skills and powers translated as something lower than a bodyguard and closer to a bandit. His recent employment in Gatou's private security force (read: thugs) only exacerbated this dichotomy. On a side he had been legitimately employed for over two years with a steady income; on the other, his job varied from keeping guard to one of many of Gatou's warehouses around Wave or harassing civilians for protection money.

In any event, he had steady money, steady booze and steady pussy. Speaking of the latter, Wave had become stale as of late. Young women had either long since left the slowly dying country or they had been _passed around_ so much there was no more pleasure to be squeezed out of them. This sad state of things had been the norm for quite a few months now with no hint of change on the horizon.

For that reason he couldn't believe his luck when, one evening, he casually went into the nearby tavern for a drink and found a new, young waitress serving at the tables.

Her apparent age was around her early twenties, with shoulder-length black hair and a slim yet endowed figure. A little bit above plain, but she looked so… _fresh_ when compared to the usual girls.

It wasn't even a matter of making a conscious decision, to be honest. It was a given that he had to get his hands on her before anyone else. Still, even in a country unofficially under his employer's thumb it wasn't like he could just force himself on her in public and get away with it. Gatou protected his interests fiercely, but his thugs getting laid weren't on his list of priorities. Not that there was much need for coercion in the first place. All the women he and his colleagues had their fun with in Wave had gone to them out of desperation.

Mamoru was a pretty likely fellow, or at least he didn't stink like his colleagues. He was sure he could charm and intimidate his way between this new gal's legs pretty easily too.

He took a seat at a table, katana lazily resting at his side and waited patiently.

"Hello there. Are you new around these parts?" he asked when she approached.

"Ah, yes," she answered shyly and a little frightened, eyeing his sword. No doubt the innkeeper had warned her about people like him. Smart man.

"Don't worry. I ain't gonna bite if that's not what you're into. What your name?"

Seemingly relaxing she smiled.

"Naruko."

Mamoru gave the best charming smile he could muster, convinced he had her already in the bag.

-xXx-

**\- The previous day. -**

Shortly after their arrival Kakashi instructed Naruto to set up a perimeter around Tazuna's place using his clones. Relatively safe from attacks, Team Seven sat at the table to discuss their course of action for the coming days.

"There's one thing I don't understand," Naruto said at one point. "Why is Gatou going through all the trouble of killing Tazuna? Wouldn't it be simpler to let him finish his damn bridge and blow it up afterwards? I mean, it's way more difficult to safeguard a bridge 24/7 for an indefinite amount of time."

"Of course," Kakashi agreed, "but the point is that Tazuna's life doesn't matter as much as the bridge he's building in the great scheme of things."

"Oi!" Tazuna protested by his side, but Kakashi pressed on unaffected.

"He's a citizen of this country and Gatou has long since bought the local Daimyo. Nothing would happen if he was killed, however once the bridge it's completed, connecting Wave and Fire, it will become an asset belonging to both countries. If Gatou played any part in destroying a piece of infrastructure our Daimyo wouldn't let it slide and he doesn't have enough money to buy him too. Eventually Konoha would be sent to deal with the situation. It's in Gatou's best interest to prevent the construction in the first place.

"… That's how it is," Tazuna admitted sourly.

"So this drunkard is an actual thorn in Gatou's side," Sasuke remarked. "Who'd have thought."

"This is payback for what I said about you guys the other day, isn't?"

"Yup," Team Seven agreed.

"That being said, we must protect Tazuna at all costs. However, there is a complication."

"Such as?" the bridge builder asked.

"Your family. They are a prime target for Gatou's men. In their place I would have taken them hostage a long time ago. Why they haven't yet is beyond me, but with Zabuza in the picture is only a matter of time before they try that. The number of people we have to protect has grown. By the way, where's your grandson?"

"Outside, playing, I think."

"Naruto, send one of you clones to bring him back. Sakura, you are tasked with their protection."

"What? Me?"

"Yes. Make a Genjutsu to change their appearance."

"Taichō, perhaps it's better if I add something to that," Naruto objected while his freshly made clone left via the closest window.

"Hm? Oh, good thinking Naruto."

With a burst of smoke, three more clones popped into existence and a moment later they all changed their appearance into to look like Tazuna and his family.

"This is a regular Henge." Sasuke observe with his Sharingan.

"Shadow clones can't do the Kage Henge," Naruto explained sullenly. "They dispel if they try."

"Still better than nothing," Kakashi offered. "If Tazuna and his family are seen around the place they won't wonder where they went. Sakura, change Tazuna's appearance in that of a worker around his age. That way he can still supervise the activity at the bridge without being obvious. Naruto, make more clones with different appearances as meat shields the real Tazuna."

"And what do I do?" the last Uchiha asked.

"Nothing."

"What?" he hissed.

"Out of the three of you, you are the best straight up fighter, Sasuke. There is no point in wasting you for anything short of an actual fight. The two of us are going to save our energy while pretending to protect the fake Tazuna."

"Very well," he agreed, mollified. Sasuke didn't particularly like being left on the sideline, but if he had to be honest he wasn't interested in any other aspect of this mission outside of actual battles. He could be a little patient in these circumstances.

"Naruto, I have another task for you."

"What's that?"

"I want you to gather information on Gatou's bases and assets around the area. Zabuza's hideout can't possibly be too far from here either. It might be pointless if our plans goes off without a hitch, but if the worse comes to pass and any of us are captured we need to know at least where to start looking. Think you can handle that?"

"I have something in mind. Say, Tsunami-san do you have any clothes I can borrow?"

"Uhm, I don't think any of Inari's clothes would fit you."

"No, no, I mean your clothes."

"What are you going to do with my clothes?"

"You'll see," he grinned.

-xXx-

Inari was a very sullen thirteen year old boy. His attitude and mood were perfectly understandable. Wave hadn't been the home of cheerfulness for a long time now and having lost his father figure to Gatou's ambitions hadn't helped in the least.

Inari had grown to believe that the strong ruled over the weak and there was just no changing that.

He wasn't wrong, per se, but he would soon have to reconsider that outlook.

"There you are."

Inari turned around and saw a blonde guy walking toward him.

"Do I know you?" he asked.

"I'm Naruto. Your gramps sent me to bring you back home."

"Uh? Why would he send you? Wait, you are a ninja. Are you one of Gatou's men?"

"As if," Naruto snorted. "Your gramps hired my team as bodyguards until he's done building his bridge. It just so happen that we have to protect you too."

"HA! How do I know you're telling the truth? For all I know you're trying to take me hostage."

"Well," Naruto scratches is head, "I suppose that not trusting strangers at face value is the smart thing to do. However, if I was out to get you, do you think I would have tried to convince you? I'm a ninja, how exactly do you think to get away from me?"

Inari narrowed his eyes… and then made a run for it. Not three steps later he was Naruto kicked the back of his legs and the younger boy found himself kneeling on the muddy ground with a kunai held to his throat.

"Point proven?" the blonde asked.

"Yeah," Inari said resignedly. "Are you really the old man's bodyguard?"

"Yes. Come on, he's waiting for you."

Inari stood up and reluctantly followed after the blonde.

"Why does he even bother anymore?"

"Hm?"

"I don't understand why he risks his life for this country," he explained. "These people aren't fucking worth it."

"Have you tried asking him that?"

"Yeah. He said some shit about fighting for the things he believes in, but that's pointless. No matter how hard he struggles people like Gatou's are always going to win."

"People like Gatou?" Naruto cocked his head. "What do you mean?"

"People who are strong, people who have power. No matter what we do they are always going to come put on top. He's just going to get himself killed."

"That's why he hired us, you know."

"Pfft. You are going to die too if you go against Gatou."

"I see. You are right. The people of this country aren't worthy of Tazuna's efforts. Cowards like you deserve everything they get."

"What did you just call me?"

"Did I stutter or are you deaf too? It must sucks to be a little shit like you."

"Listen up, bastard I won't-!"

Naruto spun and grabbed Inari's arm, twisting it and turning him around. Again the kunai went to his neck.

"I don't like your tone, shit-stain. Weaklings like you should just do as they are told, isn't that what you think?"

"…"

"That's what I thought. You were right, people like you don't deserve any piece of Tazuna's kindness. Or did you think you are any different from the people you despise? You who have given up fighting, just like them, are a fucking eyesore."

"What the hell do you know?" Inari hissed with tears pooling at the corner of his eyes. "What can someone like you understand?"

"Eh," Naruto scoffed with a dark edge in his eyes. "You really are a little shit-stain. Maybe it's better if I kill you here and now. What do you say?"

"You can't do that," Inari protested with panic in his voice. "You are supposed to protect me."

"Actually we just don't want you to be used as a hostage and you won't be much of one if you are dead, do you get what I mean?"

Naruto increased the pressure of his Kunai and a trickle of blood trailed down Inari's neck.

"Please don't," Inari begged.

"Begging won't help. I guess you can just roll over and die."

"No!" Inari shouted and frantically weaved his arms, trying to hit Naruto or at least to get away from him. Surprisingly, Naruto let him go and Inari stumbled forward falling face first into the mud.

"So you can fight back when you really want. How do you think this country would be faring now if you all fought back together? Seriously, people like you piss me off like you wouldn't believe."

"Shut up… shut up…" Inari sobbed.

"Make me. Either buy into your own drivel and shut your trap or do something to change the state of things. Either way, keep your crap to yourself. Nobody likes a whiner. Now get your ass moving before I kick you down again."

It was a very sullen, yet pensive Inari who reached Tazuna's house.

-xXx-

Meanwhile, the real Naruto changed into what seemed a younger version of Tsunami, although with a considerably wider bust, and changed into some of her old clothes. Nothing complicated, just a plain shirt and a knee-long skirt. Leaving behind several more of his clones he then wandered into the nearby town.

The situation of Wave was reflected heavily by the way the town and the townspeople looked. Gray, dulled and rundown. To proceed with her task she needed a suitable position. She couldn't just go around asking questions about Gatou unless she wanted to be discovered immediately. She needed to find a place where she could blend in and gather information.

Hence, she went looking for a job. After being refused in three different establishments because of an understandable lack of work, Naruko realized it was necessary to resort to the old methods. Using the only kunai she had taken along, she shortened her skirt closer to mid-thighs and cut a deeper neckline on her shirt. Confident that it would make all the difference required, she walked into the closest tavern, where a bespectacled old man was reading a newspaper.

"Hello? I'm looking for work."

"We're not hiring," the men replied lazily without bothering to look up.

"Please," Naruko protested with a bit more sugar in her voice. "I'm really desperate for a job. Won't you reconsider? I'll do anything."

The man finally looked up to tell her off, but stopped with his mouth half-open when he saw just who he was about to run off his tavern. Glancing up and down her figure without bothering to hide the leer, the old man smiled.

"You know what? I think I could find a spot for you, dear. I'm getting too old to serve at the table in the evenings, but I'm afraid I can pay you only with food and shelter. These are hard times."

"Oh, that is more than enough, I swear. Thank you so much. You don't know how grateful I am."

"I'm sure you'll have the opportunity to show me. You can start working right away. Go ahead and get changed. I have a spare uniform in the back room.

Naruko sauntered happily, paying no mind to the lecherous gaze of the old man as she walked past him and into the other room.

In there she found the uniform, which amounted to a short rectangular apron to wear around the waist over her regular clothes. With that set-up all she had to do was wait for the patrons to trickle in and lend a hear to their drunken chatter. Alcohol makes tongues become loose after all, and where booze fail her charms would certainly succeed.

As expected the first small fish bit the hook just a few hours later. Much to the old man's obvious disappointment, Naruko was almost dragged out of the shop at the end of her shift from one of Gatou's henchmen.

She wouldn't be sleeping at the tavern that night after all.

-xXx-

**\- Later that night -**

_Naruko_ moaned and dug her nails into the back of the man called Mamoru as he pounded her cunt with animalistic fury. It had been close to a week since she last had some and it was beginning to grate on her. She gladly welcomed the rough fucking, although she had to at least pretend some reticence in order to keep a low profile.

Kakashi had given her carte blanche as to how to operate, provided that she reported in every twelve hours. He didn't tell her to fuck her way toward the information they needed, of course. That had been Naruto's own initiative, although it was up to debate whether Kakashi expected it from her.

Not that Naruko had time for any such thought. Currently she was fully enjoying the perks of her current assignment, laying on her back and with several inches of hard cock stirring her eager pussy.

"Mmmooore…" she exhaled.

"So fucking tight!" Mamoru groaned as he complied with her request. It wasn't long before her womanhood clamped around his cock, triggering his release deep inside her.

"_**AhhaAA!**_" Naruko shrieked in orgasmic bliss, wrapping her legs around her lover's waist to prevent his escape from the depths of her flesh.

Thick ropes of cum splashed within her womb, filling her with the warmth that only a woman could truly appreciate.

They stayed like that for a few minutes, catching their breath. Then, feeling his continued hardness, Naruko rolled both of them over so that he was the one laying on his back.

"It looks like someone is ready to go again," she giggled.

"Fuck, baby. I can go on all night long with you."

"Show me," she purred, slowly grinding her hips back and forth.

They would indeed fuck until dawn. Mamoru did wonder how such a tight pussy could belong with a woman that had more sexual skills than one who had been sleeping around with several men. He really should have looked for an answer to that question, but as it often happens a man's brain stops working when his dick starts.

-xXx-

While Naruto was putting his skill to good use for both personal and professional reasons, another slender figure strolled down the streets at night.

Although the small frame and graceful features pointed out otherwise, that person was actually a young man not yet eighteen.

Haku, Zabuza's faithful tool, had been watching Tazuna's place from afar for almost an entire day. His attempts to get closer where thwarted by the number of clones surrounding the place. Just how much chakra it took to make and maintain so many solid clones was beyond Haku's comprehension but it wasn't all that relevant in the first place. What mattered was the inability to approach their target without being spotted. Although his identity was unknown to them, anyone getting too close to the bridge builder's house was bound to be considered a threat.

He needed to try a different approach. Thankfully, it seemed like there was another avenue, as he clearly saw a young woman leave the house for the nearby town.

Haku didn't know who she was. To the best of her knowledge the bridge-builder had only two living relatives. Yet there was an obvious resemblance with between this girl and Tazuna's daughter. It was easy to suppose they were related somehow, but it was just too convenient. Where did she came from? Why did she appear only now? Why did she agree to work for food and shelter if she could just stay at Tazuna's place?

Haku understood long before she introduced herself to one of Gatou's men. Naruko. Naruto. It was so obvious she was the blonde kid and yet again it didn't make all that sense. He kept observing quietly but try as he might he couldn't detect any Genjutsu or other emissions of chakra. She was no sensor, but he was good enough to detect a working jutsu if he could examine it from relatively close and nearly undisturbed. Even a Kekkei Genkai didn't explain it, as they required chakra just like anything else. He had to resign himself to admit that this what Naruto actual appearance and that her resemblance to Tsunami was either coincidental or the product of some clever make-up. Also the blond persona she usually wore had the a clever disguise she used all the time.

Well, two could play that game. Haku could pass for a person of the opposite gender just as Naruko could pass as a man and without using any chakra either. Might as well try to get close to her and gain as much insight as she could.

When it became obvious she was not going back for the night, Haku put his own plan into action.

"Excuse me," he said walking inside the establishment where Naruko had found employment. " I'm looking for work."

"We're not hiring," the old man replied without bothering to look up.

"Please," Haku begged. "I'm really desperate for a job. Won't you reconsider? I'll do anything."

The owner finally looked up with a snarl on his face, but immediately reconsidered the words about to leave his mouth, as well as his own fortune, when he gazed on the figure in front of him.

"Ah, what the hell," he grumbled under his breath. "What do I even have to lose?"

When Naruko came back the next morning, she found an unexpected co-worker waiting for her.

Haku thought he had things well in hand and while Naruko didn't suspect a thing, the Hyōton user didn't know the trouble he was about to be dragged into.

* * *

Last edited: 04.18.2015


	9. Rising Waves (IV)

**Chapter 9  
Rising Waves (IV)**

* * *

From personal experience Haku knew that the life of a ninja was filled with hardships. Being the tool (and disciple) of a Nukenin for years made it even more so. Living on the run, scraping for food at time and fighting or hiding from the many hunter-nin on others, taught Haku not to complain about the circumstances.

Yet this was a level of ignominy he never even remotely imagined he'd have to sustain in his life.

"W-w-what the hell is this?" the effeminate-looking boy stuttered at the sight of the thing in his hands.

"Well, since I hired two pretty girls to work as waitresses I thought it was a shame not to have appropriate uniforms for the two of you to wear."

"Wow, thank you so much mister," Naruko gushed, holding her uniform to the chest while dancing around happily. "This is so nice."

"They are not nice at all," Haku muttered under his breath. The thing called a 'uniform' was a single piece of clothing that went from the shoulders to somewhere well above the mid-thigh.

It was short. Way too short and revealing for him to wear. For one thing he couldn't use his regular underwear with it and he sure as hell he couldn't go _commando_. This was an unprecedented crisis!

"I made sure to bring some suitable underwear for you gals," the owner said, rubbing his hands lecherously. "Make sure to put them on too."

"Underwear?" Haku asked, shifting through his bundle of clothes. Indeed he found something that could be used in such fashion, however it amounted to a strapless bra and a… string with a triangle?

Oh, no. Hell, no!

"Oh, mister, you are so thoughtful! Come on, Haku. Let's put these on!"

Haku was suddenly very tempted to quit this mission and disappear, but that would have meant failing his Master and he couldn't forgive himself that. Gritting his teeth, Haku made up his resolve.

-xXx-

Sasuke was sitting cross-legged at the bridge, spinning leaves on his fingertips as a way to exercise his chakra control. A few meters away _'Tazuna'_ was supervising the activities. There were very few workers left to help with the construction, most having ditched the job to avoid Gatou's wrath, but to nearly everyone's surprise Naruto picked up the slack.

When Naruto's clones popped out more clones and all went to help with the construction, the only one not surprised in the least was Kakashi.

Sasuke couldn't yet wrap his mind around the living mystery that was Uzumaki Naruto. The alleged dead last of the class had revealed himself to be an asset beyond measure. While Sasuke was confident he could win nine times out of ten in a straight up spar, he was acutely aware that Naruto could outlast him with his immense chakra reserves or even outsmart him. It wasn't that Naruto was more intelligent, but Sasuke had to acknowledge that the blonde could be unpredictable like few others. The last Uchiha couldn't begin to fathom how the mind of a bisexual, gender-changing, shape-shifting prankster worked at all.

And then there was Sakura. The useless fan-girl had found her niche of talent and she was steadily growing as a kunoichi, to the point that her Genjutsu was able to temporarily fool a Jonin, even if only because of the circumstances involved.

In comparison, how was he faring? He understood the value beyond Kakashi's training method. He knew that just stockpiling jutsu after jutsu wouldn't make him any stronger but it was frustrating not seeing himself progressing like his teammates. Was it arrogance, to think that he was better than them because he was Uchiha?

Yes, he admitted to himself that it was. Kakashi's words about the haughtiness of his clan being part of the reason for their near-extinction rang more true than ever in the light of Naruto and Sakura's growth.

He needed more dedication. More focus. And more importantly he needed to prevent his jealousy at their success from unbalancing him. Whether Naruto and Sakura were stronger or weaker than him was immaterial. There was only one person he needed to surpass. And he would.

Elsewhere Sakura was having similar thoughts. For all of recent development, she was still feeling outclassed by her two teammates. Sasuke's genius had been confirmed in the previous weeks of interaction and much to her chagrin Naruto turned out to be a particular brand of genius too.

Sakura was still profoundly freaked out by his gender-thing, as well as his (her?) stated sexual promiscuity.

_'__Freak'_ was the word she used to label Naruto in her mind. He wasn't bad but quite frankly she felt he was creepy and disgusting in the casual use he made of his body. She knew he wasn't hurting anyone on a conscious level but it still made her feel sick. That he could turn into a woman objectively more attractive than she ever could hope to be did not help his case with her.

But she had to put that aside and out of her mind. Naruto was a good teammate, perhaps even a good friend, no matter how little she liked him. Maybe it was her duty as a ninja to grow past her distaste for him and Sakura was many things but not someone who would willingly derelict her duty.

Besides, her current concerns were entirely different. She had moved Tazuna's family under Genjutsu to a separate location. They weren't exactly happy, especially Tsunami who lamented that she couldn't go to work like this. As Sakura understood, it was only the woman's labor that put food on the table.

However, their safety was paramount. Now that they were out of the way she could rejoin her team at the bridge and help protect Tazuna.

-xXx-

"Kuuh…" Haku groaned, pulling down her skirt that had climbed above the curve of his butt the moment she lifted his arms to pick a bottle of liquor from a shelf above his head, causing appreciative whistles to erupt from the patrons in sight. Much to his disappointment, his evident embarrassment only served to fuel the lust of the clientele.

He managed to get changed by pretending (not much of an effort) to be too shy to get changed around others, thus managing to keep his gender secret by stuffing his bra with the bandages he usually kept around his chest. Slipping into the thong had been more difficult, considering how he had an extra part that the flimsy piece of clothing (if one could call it that) was not designed to hold.

It did help somewhat that Haku was anything but endowed in that department. Actually, even with his legs exposed more than ever no one could ever being to suspect his true gender just by looking. There wasn't a single hair to be found anywhere on his body except on the head. Puberty seemed to have slipped by without considering him at all.

His skin was silken, his lips full and his waist thin, while his bottom was round and soft-looking more that any man had any right to be. Even his neck and the curves of his shoulders and arms were delicate and feminine.

Really, not for the first time in his life Haku thought he would have been better off being born as a woman.

As it was, Haku was stuck between a rock and a hard place. Especially since the owner's choice of uniform seemed to have drawn anyone who still had a little money to waste on cheap booze. By noon the place was filled with old drunkards who didn't know the meaning of proper behavior even when sober and Haku had to withstand lots of _'accidental'_ touches in the course of her shift.

Naruko on the other hand was clearly basking in the attention. She flirted shamelessly with anyone, always leaning forward a bit more than necessary when serving at the tables. Her willingness, as well as her more endowed body eased the attention Haku received, but as there were people who were more into his body type apparently.

The owner too was ecstatic about the surprising development of his investment.

This was getting worse by the minute and it wasn't event the end of his first day undercover. Would he actually manage to find out anything like this?

Naruko didn't seem to have any contact with her teammates that Haku could tell. It was obvious that she was getting in the good grace of the townspeople and the occasional thugs to gather intel on Gatou's resources in Wave, but how was he relying them? Maybe she had yet to find anything worthwhile?

Maybe Haku was mistaken and this entire set up was a way to throw Zabuza off their actual plans? Did Naruko know who he was? Haku had no choice but to stick to his current course of action and hope for the best.

What Haku didn't know was that there were several clones of Naruto among the patrons, as well as hiding among the people of Wave. While it was true that his clones couldn't do the Kage Henge without dispelling, Naruto had forgotten to say that any of his clones would retain the appearance of the original at the moment of their making.

Drunkards, beggars and impoverished merchants passing by. Naruto was slowly getting everywhere, investigating the smallest lead that the original gathered. Between Kage Bushin and Kage Henge, Naruto was a spy network on his own. Very few people, Kakashi included, realized the sheer magnitude of what Naruto could accomplish with those combined techniques. The reason why the Sharingan-bearing Jonin had given Naruto this particular assignment was more to test his ability in the long run rather than any practical application in the current mission.

Naruto didn't know about that and even Haku didn't suspect that he was wasting his time trying to figure out an inexistent enemy plot.

The rankless shinobi would have been much better off watching his Master's back from the machination of their treacherous employer.

-xXx-

Gatou wasn't a man who enjoyed wasting his time. He had many business ventures to oversee; many investments in progress. Wave was perhaps his most daring yet, but it was by far not the most important. That a single bridge builder caused him to lose so much time that he could otherwise employ in getting even more reach was by all accounts unacceptable.

Worse yet, the ninja he hired (with a considerable payment upfront) hadn't managed to get rid of him. On a personal level, he could forgive the bridge builder for watching out for his own interest. As a businessman he understood that. He'd would still kill him, mind you, but he could respect him. He wasn't nearly so inclined to do the same with Zabuza and his ilk. It was high time he started to see some return on his investment and if Zabuza wouldn't provide it, then Gatou would find a mean to cut his losses and come out on top.

"So, we have an agreement," he said the masked figure in front of him. "As soon as the job is done."

The other person nodded and disappeared into thin air after a flurry of hand seals.

Gatou smirked at the empty space. Ninja were dangerous and all that, but underestimating the shrewdness of a businessman of his caliber is like having a dead wish.

Something Zabuza would soon find out.

-xXx-

Sasuke eyed Naruto's clone. The false blonde was sitting cross-legged on a side of the bridge, reading a scroll.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"What does it look like?" Naruto asked without looking up. "I'm studying."

"What's the point? You are a clone, aren't you?"

"Excuse me," he harrumphed somewhat offended, "I'm a Shadow Clone."

"So what? You are still a clone. Everything you learn will disappear with you."

"Kage Bushin are different," Kakashi explained. "Everything they experience mentally return to their maker when they are dispelled."

Sasuke turned to Kakashi, blinking slowly as he processed this information.

"Hold up," he said with a tinge of annoyance in his voice. " If that's the case doesn't it mean that he can make a thousand clones and use them to learn something, anything, a thousand times faster than normal?"

Kakashi shrugged noncommittally. "I don't know. I can't make more than a few myself and I never tested how it worked in the long term. They are too draining for me to be worth the effort. Naruto?"

"Nah," the blonde sighed, shaking his head. "I wish it was like that but it doesn't really work that way. Think about it, Bastard, do you think that a thousand amateur sculptors could make a masterpiece if they all worked together? If I did something like that, at the end of the day I'd have a crappy statue, a thousand less-than-amateurs sculptors and a splitting headache. Experience is something you build, not something you accumulate."

"That's surprising insightful, Naruto," Sakura observed. "Did you think of that yourself?"

"Actually it was the Hokage who told me that," Naruto replied.

"Let me guess," Kakashi chuckled. "It was right after you tried the thousand clones thing and knocked yourself out, wasn't it?"

Naruto grumbled and looked away and Sasuke snorted.

"Still, it does sound quite useful for a number of reasons. You can still learn multiple things that way, isn't it?"

"Only if I don't overdo it," the clone admitted. "If I stuff too much information into my brain at once I don't think I'll be able to recall anything when I wake up from the backlash. Seriously, it's barely enough to balance how slow I'd be to learn theoretical things otherwise. The best uses are as decoys, for espionage and for fighting."

"Like that's nothing," Sasuke himself grumbled. "I'm going to learn that jutsu when I have enough chakra. It's too useful to pass up."

"Fine," Naruto shrugged. "Knock yourself out. Literally."

"And I'll learn that Kage Henge too."

"Want to feel like a woman, uh?" Naruto teased, wiggling his eyebrows. Sakura's eyes nearly bulged out of her head as her eyes flew to Sasuke.

"NO!" Sasuke objected vehemently. "It's just great for camouflage."

"Yeah. I advise against it though," Naruto warned. "I have been told that I've risked giving myself an aneurism several times until I mastered it, so clear your schedule from anything important before giving it a try. You might end up not being able to do much else but drooling like an idiot all the time if you mess it up."

"I'll pass then," Sasuke nodded. "One drooling idiot is already enough for all the Elemental Nations."

"Just so you know, you can go fuck yourself anytime," Naruto spat, returning to his scroll. With a scoff, Sasuke too returned to his exercises.

Sakura and Kakashi sighed, both shaking their head at the exchange. Those two together were too much to handle.

-xXx-

When night fell upon the city, Naruko and Haku retreated to their shared room, where Naruko promptly stripped out of her working clothes and stepped into something comfortable, and to Haku surprise, more modest.

"I don't know how you can handle those people," Haku confessed, both because it was true and because he wanted to strike up a conversation and get closer to his prey.

"What? They aren't so bad. Sure they get a little frisky, but that's only because they like us," Naruko replied. "I mean, aren't we the ones to blame for making them like that, aren't we?"

"How did you came up with that idea?" Haku asked, disbelief etched across his face.

"Am I wrong? Aren't we the ones dressed in sexy clothes, using our charms to draw customers?"

"That's only because the owner made us do it."

Naruko shrugged. "It's not like he forced you. If you disliked it so much, you could have refused."

"He wouldn't have hired me I did," Haku protested.

"You still went through with it, though," Naruko shrugged. "You can fault them for liking you that way."

"I don't think we are ever going to agree on that."

"We don't have to, but if you find it difficult maybe you should consider quitting."

"I... I can't," Haku stuttered.

"Why? Is your situation that bad?"

"It's not that. I… I have someone here. A precious person."

"A… precious person?" Naruko asked, interest piqued.

"Yes. Do you know what I'm talking about? It's someone for whom you want to become stronger, to protect them. Did you ever had someone like that?"

Naruko stare became distant, hurt flickering across her eyes.

"Yeah. I used to."

"I'm sorry," Haku apologized. Though they were enemies he didn't enjoy hurting her. "I didn't want to bring up sour memories."

"It's okay. It's been a long time since then. Anyway, I understand where you're coming from perfectly. If I can help you in any way, just let me know."

"Thanks. I appreciate it."

"Well, I'm turning in for the night. See you in the morning, Haku-chan."

"Yeah. Good night, Naruko-chan."

-xXx-

In the darkness of her room, Naruko lay awake beside a sleeping Haku.

A precious person. Yes, he did use to have someone like that. Sure he had the old man Hokage, Miwako and his teammates now, but it wasn't the same thing. Even if they did cared, they mostly put up with him in her opinion. Well, perhaps not Miwako, but that was different. The old man Hokage was sad every time she looked at her and it broke her heart a little each time.

He was different, unique, and not in a way most people considered positive.

There had been a person, only one, who truly knew him from the inside out and loved all the more for it.

-xXx-

**_Naruto : Age Thirteen_**

_Naruto, Nako to everyone else, had known "uncle Shirata" for only a couple of weeks and it had been the best time of her life. He opened his home to her and made it clear that she was free to come and go as she pleased._

_She gave her many gifts and clothes, pampering her with praises and compliments. He was always kind with her and knew how to touch her in a way that made her skin tingle._

_She often snuggled into his chest, sitting his lap when he was sitting at his desk doing paperwork. He caressed her legs gently and that made her heart pound faster and her breath ragged. She always had to calm herself afterward when he had left. _

_Nako wasn't stranger to her own arousal, but the way Shirota made her feel was unique. She wondered what he would have thought if he knew about it. He would have probably thought she was a freak, therefore she never mentioned it to him._

_That was quite pointless, seeing how he walked onto her masturbating on his bed one day, clutching one of his used kimono._

_Nako was mortified. She sought to hide so that he wouldn't see her so that he wouldn't see what kind of face he was making._

_But he would have nothing of that. She gently took her wrists and forced her to look at him, which she did with teary eyes. _

_He then proceeded to tell her that she had nothing to be ashamed of. That he was happy she felt that way about him._

_"Do you want to feel good, Nako?" he asked her. "I can make you feel much better than this."_

_Elated that she wasn't going to be pushed away, afraid that he'd be disappointed if she refused, she promptly accepted his offer._

_She didn't regret it. The old man knew what he was doing. Nako had never felt anything better until that point. Even Ramen wasn't as good and that was saying something._

_Shirata had experience and knew better than to force her hand. Instead of going straight for the main course he took his sweet time with her. He showered her with kisses, kneading her body gently. He had her breathing raggedly in a matter of minutes, but he always took care to ask if she wanted to continue or if she'd rather stop. _

_By that time, she was already putty in his hands so even if she was a bit scared of her own emotions she asked him to continue without a second thought, afraid of doing even the slightest thing to displease him._

_She raised no objection when she asked her to lay on her back and spread her legs._

_His tongue found her wet young pussy and again Nako rediscovered the meaning of pleasure once more. Over and over again Shirata's tongue made her scream in delight. She couldn't believe there was something that felt so good. If that wasn't enough to break whatever restriction she might have had in regards of sex, his next words blasted them away._

_"__You're so cute, Nako. I'm think I'm falling in love with you."_

_Naruto, who never heard such words directed at her, felt her heart soar to impossible heights. _

_"__I love you too oji-san," she replied with tears filled eyes, feeling happier than ever before. And she did love him, in the misguided way that only a severely neglected child could._

_He then kissed her squarely on the mouth, tongue slipping through her soft young lips. Nako kissed back with abandon while his fingers toyed with her soaked pussy, much to her continued delight._

_When they pulled apart he looked at her. "Then make me feel good too," he told her softly, presenting his erected manhood to her face._

_Before that time, if she was told to out her mouth on the thing boy use to pee she would have recoiled, but the old man had thoroughly broken every inhibition she ever had. There was no hesitation when she wrapped her little mouth around his cock, especially since he kept using his fingers on her._

_Of course she was completely inexperienced in the art of pleasing a man, but on the other hand she was by far the youngest and juiciest piece of meat Shirata ever managed to put his hands on. The sight of a thirteen years old girl, with the potential of becoming a stunningly beautiful woman, sucking on his cock, eager to please instead of screaming in horror, was the fulfillment of a dream._

_He had the courtesy of telling her that if she swallowed what was about to come out of his dick, he would reward her plenty. Nako had every intention to make him as happy as she possibly could, so when the creamy substance filled her mouth she swallowed it greedily._

_When she was finished, she looked up at him, short of breath but with a bright, happy smile. _

_"__Did you like it, oji-san?"_

_Shirata liked it very much and until nightfall he pleasured her with his tongue, taking a break only when she begged to let her please him in return._

_When he sent her on her way he told her not to mention what happened to anyone, because people who were envious would try to pull them apart, never to see each other again. It was to be their secret._

_Nako was too terrified by the prospect of losing him to even consider questioning what was had been told and at the same time she was very happy to have a secret that wasn't only her own. She returned home happier than ever and slept the best sleep of her whole life, feeling loved to her core._

_Even after that Shirata was very careful around Nako and instead of pushing to take her virginity he took time to make her feel more and more at ease around him._

_Despite being quite obviously (not to Nako) a pervert, the man wasn't a monster and he treated her like he would an older woman as much as he could. He bought her beautiful clothes and showered her with gifts. She gladly wore whatever outfit he bought her in the privacy of his house. It was one of his favorite games to dress her up in different manners, only to undress her and ravish her with his mouth._

_Refined clothes, normal clothes, skimpy clothes. Nako wore them all without exception. Some of them were things she knew she couldn't wear in public, as they were the same as being naked, but her beloved oji-san liked them so much it made her heart flutter when she put them on._

_Nako began associating looking good to being loved, and began putting renewed efforts into tweaking her forms, as well as making a good use of the makeup Shirata bought her. At the same time she also began finding pleasure in pleasing. _

_She started looking forward to the idea of touching a man. Having his semen in her mouth went from being gross to give her a strange flutter in her stomach. Shirata was very happy when she told him she liked drinking it. He patted her on the head and always made sure to finish in her mouth from then onward._

_It finally came the day when he took her virginity. Nako had studied the human anatomy in depths in order to pull off perfect transformations, so she knew perfectly well what the basic intercourse entailed from a biological standpoint, she only lacked knowledge of the social implications._

_So, although she was surprised how much it hurt when his dick broke through her hymen, she didn't push him back. She bit her lip through the tears and told him that all he wanted was for him to feel good with her body and that nothing else mattered._

_He was gentle at the beginning, but he was obviously holding back his lust. However, when Nako told him he could come inside her the man lost all reason and finished the last few thrust with like a rabid beast, coming into her womb with long, powerful ejaculations._

_Nako was in too much pain to enjoy the act, but the hot feeling of her oji-san semen in the depths of her belly gave her a strange sense of fulfillment. It took a couple more session before she started feeling any good by being penetrated, but when the last remnants of pain faded, she used the same enthusiasm as she did with everything else._

_What followed were some of the best weeks of her young life. Having discovered the joys of sex on top of the overflowing love she perceived, Naruko was in a state of constant bliss that she hoped would never change. Of course, the old man was far too greedy to be content with having a fourteen years old girl fulfilling his every sexual needs. _

_"Hey, Nako," he told her one day, stroking her head gently while she sucked his dick. "I have a couple of friends who really want to meet you. Do you think you can be as nice to them as you've been to me?"_

_Nako would have never refused him anything. He was her world and she would have given him everything he wanted without a second thought._

_Now, had Shirata been even slightly less greedy, perhaps things would have continued without problems._

_Even if it was only a lie, she would have been happy if it continued on forever like that._

_Alas, that was not the case and Nako's life changed once more._

-xXx-

**Present time.**

In her futon, Naruko turned to the side, eyes glistening.

"A precious person..." she said under her breath.

She could only agree with Haku. No matter what she had to do, she'd keep her precious people happy.

That was the meaning of being Hokage, after all. To be strong enough to keep everyone happy. She'll make it there one day so that she wouldn't lose anyone anymore.

* * *

**Last edited: 06/01/2015**


End file.
